The Court of Appeal sitting in Abuja yesterday granted the prayers for the discharge and acquittal of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, the renowned IPOB leader, and freedom fighter.
Subsequently, after the news of this judgment broke to the general public, the office of the Attorney General of the Federation released a newsletter stating that they will approach the Supreme court to appeal against the judgment of the court of appeal, they also maintained that Mazi Nnamdi Kanu was only Discharged but was never Acquitted by the Court of Appeal as the public may have believed.
Whether the court of Appeal Discharged and Acquitted Nnamdi Kanu or he was merely discharged but not acquitted as stated by the office of the Attorney General of the Federation is not the interest of this particular essay but will rather be the subject of another essay but the interest of this piece is to clear the confusion on the mind of the readers who have reached out demanding to know what is the meaning of Discharge and Acquittal and what is the difference between both orders of the court.
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As some may know, Discharge and Acquittal go hand in hand in criminal justice but sometimes, a suspect may be Discharged but not acquitted by the court.
Acquittal as an order given by the court in a criminal trial simply means “legally freeing the accused from the crime he was accused of” because he has been found innocent by the court after considering the merits of the case and considering all the facts and evidence submitted in this regard during the trial. Whereas, Discharge means a legal order of release given by the court when the grounds on which the accused was arrested and charged came out as false, unsubstantiated, or illegal.
Therefore, an order of acquittal is given because after going through the merits of the case, the accused was found not guilty by the court, while the order of discharge is given because the charge of the prosecution against the accused person was not substantiated or that the prosecution has not proven the case against the accused person beyond a reasonable doubt or that there are illegalities or irregularities that led to that arrest of the accused. The order of discharge is usually given by the court when there is no sufficient evidence pointing against the accused as having committed the offense.
