Nigerian Prison fails to bring Binance Executive to Court for Arraignment

The Federal High Court in Abuja on Wednesday delayed proceedings in the tax evasion case against Tigran Gambaryan, a U.S. citizen and Binance’s head of financial crime compliance, citing the failure of the Nigeria Prison Service to bring him to court for arraignment. The Nigerian court rescheduled the hearing for June 14.

Gambaryan, who was remanded in prison during the last court appearance, was not brought to court on Wednesday to take his plea in his tax evasion charges., consequently stalling the court process. 

According to local media reports, there was no explanation for Gambaryan’s absence in court. However, the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) has blamed the Nigeria Correctional Service for failing to produce Gambaryan in court.

Moses Ideho, the lawyer representing FIRS, expressed confusion over the absence of Gambaryan in court. Moses told the court that Gambaryan should have been brought from custody by the Nigerian prison service, but I don’t know the reason he is not here.” 

“We have been trying to get to representatives of the correctional centre, and we are yet to get a response on why they are not here. It is their duty to bring him to court,” he added.

Chukwuka Ikwuazo, an attorney representing Gambaryan, stated that they had been in court since 9:00 a.m. and did not understand why the case would be put on hold. He claimed that since the defendant is being held by the federal government, the prosecution could not claim that he was unaware of his whereabouts.

Mr. Ikwuazo added that Anjarwalla, the third defendant on the amended charge, is still listed as "at large," and since this could postpone the trial, the court should be made aware of it.

Whaleinsider.news reported earlier that on February 28, the Nigerian security agency detained two senior Binance executives, Nadeem Anjarwalla, who works as the regional manager for Africa, and Tigran Gambaryan, who oversees financial crime compliance at Binance.

The Nigerian authorities had accused Binance Exchange of influencing foreign exchange (FX) rates, which led to the arrest of two of the company executives when they arrived in Nigeria. They were detained for several weeks before Anjarwalla was reported to have escaped from custody.

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