Lagos State High Court sitting in Ikeja has convicted and sentenced a man, John Nwawuto Anoruo, for impersonating a legal practitioner and using a forged seal of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA).
Justice A. M. Lawal delivered the judgment on Tuesday after the defendant pleaded guilty to a two-count charge brought by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
Anoruo, who operates a legal and educational consultancy in the Ikorodu area of Lagos, was arrested by operatives of the EFCC on April 20, 2026.
The case originated after he submitted a petition dated Sept. 22, 2025, to the EFCC on behalf of his clients against Global West Vessel Specialist Nigeria Limited.
Investigations later revealed that both the petition and a subsequent letter withdrawing the complaint bore a counterfeit NBA seal, which the defendant admitted obtaining from a business centre in Lagos.
The EFCC further discovered that although Anoruo claimed to have obtained a law degree from the University of Nigeria in 2018 through evening classes, he was never called to the Nigerian Bar because he did not attend the Nigerian Law School.
One of the charges alleged that the defendant fraudulently used a counterfeit NBA seal bearing Supreme Court enrolment number SCN037400 with the intent to present it as genuine, contrary to the Criminal Law of Lagos State.
The second count accused him of falsely presenting himself to the EFCC as a qualified legal practitioner entitled to practise law in Nigeria while using an NBA seal that belonged to another lawyer.
Following the defendant’s guilty plea, prosecution counsel, Saadatu Mahmud Yabo, called EFCC investigator Umar Faruk Ahmad to review the facts of the case.
Ahmad told the court that the commission received a petition from legal practitioner Adeyinka Olumide-Fusika alleging that Anoruo had falsely represented himself as a lawyer while filing petitions against him and his law firm.
According to the witness, investigations confirmed that the Supreme Court enrolment number on the NBA seal belonged to another legal practitioner.
He added that the defendant admitted obtaining the forged seal from a Lagos business centre and acknowledged that he was not qualified to practise law in Nigeria.
The investigator further disclosed that Anoruo earned ₦7.5 million from the legal brief in question and paid ₦1.5 million to a qualified lawyer to handle the matter on his behalf.
He also told the court that when Anoruo honoured the EFCC’s invitation, he appeared wearing a legal practitioner’s robe, while a subsequent search of his residence led to the recovery of the counterfeit NBA seal.
The prosecution tendered several exhibits, including the petition, the defendant’s extra-judicial statement, correspondence with the Body of Benchers and the Supreme Court of Nigeria, the legal practitioner’s attire, the forged NBA seal and evidence of a ₦300,000 bank draft paid into the EFCC’s recovery account.
The defence did not object to the admissibility of the exhibits, which were admitted by the court.
In his plea for leniency, defence counsel G.E. Demkemefa described the defendant as a first-time offender, the breadwinner of a family comprising his wife and five children, and urged the court to impose a fine instead of a custodial sentence.
Justice Lawal subsequently sentenced Anoruo to a fine of ₦120,000 on the first count and ₦150,000 on the second count, bringing the total fine to ₦270,000.
The court also ordered the forfeiture of the legal practitioner’s robe and the counterfeit NBA seal recovered from the defendant to the Federal Government through the EFCC.
