Lami Dawa Borno 14-Year Sentence Appeal Divides Christians and Lawyers

Lami Samuel Dawa taught children in a primary school. Now she is serving 14 years in prison, and the argument over why she is there has split even the Christians who are fighting for her.

The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) has filed an appeal against the 14-year prison sentence handed to Dawa, a Christian woman in Borno State, over allegations involving the conversion of a Muslim woman to Christianity, according to the Chronicle. CAN President Archbishop Daniel Okoh disclosed the appeal on Saturday, 31 October, and said the case raised questions about religious freedom and constitutional rights.

Dawa was sentenced to 14 years' imprisonment without an option of fine by Justice A.B. Kumdila of the Borno State High Court on 5 May 2026, according to the Chronicle. She was convicted under Section 210 of the Borno State Penal Code, which concerns depriving a parent of the lawful custody of a child.

That last sentence is where the simple version of this story breaks down. The case first caught fire online with headlines saying a Christian woman had been jailed for sharing her faith, or for converting a Muslim woman in Gwoza. The court record, as described by two separate Nigerian outlets, tells a different and much harder story.

Lami Dawa Borno Case: What the Court Actually Heard

Daily Trust, in an opinion piece by a lawyer who says he read the full judgement and the certified record of proceedings, reports that the person at the centre of the trial was a girl, not an adult woman. The girl told the court she was born in 2009, that she was 13 when she was first abducted, converted and taken to Jos, and 16 when she testified in December 2025.

The events happened in Maiduguri, not Gwoza, according to Daily Trust. She was a minor at every stage that matters, Daily Trust reports, which is why the charges were brought under the Borno State Child Protection Law.

Daily Trust describes the girl's sworn account in brief. After her first disappearance and return, her mother asked a trusted neighbour, Mrs Dawa, to help re-enrol her in school. By the girl's account, Mrs Dawa then told her that her own parents were plotting to kill her, gave her a phone and a SIM card, and put her in a car bound for Jos.

The Lawyers Who Defended Her Urge Caution

The most uncomfortable voices in this story belong to Dawa's own side. The Christian Lawyers Fellowship of Nigeria (CLASFON), whose members represented Dawa and the other defendants during the trial, has cautioned against portraying the conviction as a straightforward case of a woman imprisoned simply for preaching Christianity, according to the Chronicle.

Ephraim Yidawi, chairman of CLASFON's Maiduguri branch, told the Chronicle that the allegations went beyond religious evangelism. They included conspiracy to abduct a child, inducing a child to leave parental custody, removing the child from her parents' lawful custody, depriving her of access to education, and interfering with her religious practice and conversion to Christianity.

Yidawi therefore cautioned against portraying the case as one in which Dawa was imprisoned simply for preaching Christianity to a Muslim woman, the Chronicle reports.

Daily Trust makes the same point more bluntly. Six people were charged, and the court acquited most of the Christian defendants, Daily Trust reports, including two women who received the girl in 2022 and Dawa's own husband, Amos Suleiman. The Chronicle confirms the shape of that outcome, reporting that the other defendants were discharged and acquitted while Dawa was convicted.

How the 14 Years Were Calculated

Much of the outrage centres on the 14-year term, so the arithmetic matters. Mrs Dawa was convicted on three counts and sentenced to 14, 14 and 10 years respectively, according to Daily Trust. The court had the discretion to order those terms to run consecutively, one after the other, which would have meant 38 years in prison.

It did not. After she pleaded for leniency, the court ordered all three sentences to run concurrently, Daily Trust reports. She will serve 14 years in total, no more than the longest single term.

Daily Trust also reports a fact that undercuts the sectarian reading of the case: the girl's mother was born a Christian, and her grandmother and other relatives remain Christians to this day.

That does not settle the case. Daily Trust itself notes that lawyers may reasonably debate aspects of the court's reasoning, and that an appeal has now been filed. The Chronicle reports that CAN urged the authorities to ensure the rights of all parties were protected.

Readers following Nigeria's persecuted church can read the latest Benue attack in Gunmen Kill Pastor and Three Others in Benue Market Attack November 2026 and the Benue kidnapping in Latest: Seven Christian Mourners Kidnapped in Benue as $23000 Ransom Demanded. The American political response to Nigeria's violence is covered in Latest: US Congressman Riley Moore Says Christians in Nigeria Still Face Unspeakable Violence November 2026.

What the Appeal Will Decide

The appeal is now the place where this story will be settled, if it is settled at all. An appellate court will examine the conviction and the legal issues arising from the proceedings, according to the Chronicle.

Okoh, for CAN, maintained that every Nigerian had the right to freely choose, change or practise a religion without coercion, intimidation or unlawful punishment, according to the Chronicle. He also said plainly, as Daily Trust credits him, that the precise facts and legal basis of the conviction were still being verified when CAN first spoke.

That honesty is the hinge of the whole case. A woman is in prison for 14 years. A child was taken from her parents.

A church body says religious freedom is at stake. Her own lawyers say the public story is incomplete. The appeal court will have to hold all four truths at once, and whichever way it rules, one question will follow it out of the courtroom: when a case mixes faith and a missing child, who gets to decide which story the world hears first.

But the most surprising part of this story is yet to come — keep reading.