Owo Church Massacre: Court Admits Key Evidence as DSS Closes Case Against Suspects

The Federal High Court sitting in Abuja has admitted fresh confessional statements and a Digital Forensic Examination Report in the ongoing trial of five suspects accused of carrying out the deadly attack on St. Francis Catholic Church, Owo, Ondo State.

Justice Emeka Nwite admitted the exhibits after defence counsel, Abdullahi Mohammed, raised no objection to their presentation in court.

The June 5, 2022 attack claimed the lives of at least 41 worshippers and left over 140 others injured, marking one of the deadliest assaults on a religious gathering in recent Nigerian history.

Also admitted as evidence was a Tecno mobile phone, which investigators said revealed critical communication exchanges among the defendants before and after the attack.

During proceedings, the Department of State Services, which is prosecuting the case, officially closed its presentation after calling 11 witnesses to establish the charges against the accused persons.

Following the closure, Justice Nwite adjourned the matter to March 4 and 5, 2026, for the defendants to begin their defence.

Earlier, defence counsel informed the court that the accused persons would testify personally and requested unrestricted access to them in DSS custody to enable proper trial preparation.

At the hearing, the DSS’s final witness, identified as PSSK, a senior officer in forensic and counter-terrorism operations, detailed how advanced geospatial network filtering technology was deployed to track communications linked to the attack.

He explained that thousands of phone numbers were analysed, narrowing the investigation to the phone line of the fifth defendant, Idris Abdulmalik Omeiza, whose arrest in Ifon, Ondo State, eventually led to the apprehension of the remaining four suspects.

According to the witness, forensic analysis confirmed that the defendants maintained consistent communication before and after the attack, suggesting coordinated planning and execution.

Under cross-examination, the DSS operative disclosed that the investigation lasted more than one month and resulted in the arrest of all five suspects in August 2022 across different locations in Ondo and Kogi states.