Stone Rockers Quarry Remains Crime Scene, Mining Marshals Tell Court

Stone Rockers Quarry Remains Crime Scene, Mining Marshals Tell Court

The battle over the sealed Stone Rockers quarry in Abuja has shifted from a dispute over an alleged 13-month shutdown to a question of whether an active criminal case can be allowed to dictate the fate of the site.

The Mining Marshals have defended the continued closure, saying the quarry is not under an administrative sanction but remains the locus criminis in an ongoing criminal prosecution before the Federal High Court.

The agency’s position follows a recent petition by Stone Rockers Nigeria Limited to President Bola Tinubu and other senior officials, in which the company challenged the legality of the shutdown and alleged that it was being kept out of its operations without a court order.

But the Commander of the Mining Marshals said the company and its director, Kolawole Olaiya, are defendants in Charge No. FHC/ABM/VR/338/2026 over alleged illegal mining within a mineral title area belonging to Lord’s Career Ventures Nigeria Limited.

According to the Commander, the investigation followed petitions from the complainant company which were referred to the Mining Marshals by the Ministers of Solid Minerals Development and Interior through the Commandant General of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps.

He said the defendants were arrested at coordinates which investigators established fell within Mining Lease No. 000395 ML, held by Lord’s Career Ventures.

A January 23, 2026 letter from the Mining Cadastre Office, he added, confirmed the location.

The Mining Marshals also said documentary evidence gathered during the investigation, including correspondence allegedly written by a member of the defence team, would form part of the prosecution’s case.

The Commander accused the defendants of seeking extrajudicial intervention while related criminal and civil matters remain before the courts, warning that such actions could prejudice the proceedings.

He also dismissed allegations of financial inducement, insisting that enforcement decisions were based on evidence and that the complainant did not fund the operation that led to the arrests.

Meanwhile, the agency said prosecutors had initially excluded workers arrested during the enforcement operation because they were employees of a disclosed principal and may not have possessed the requisite criminal intent.

That position is now being reviewed, however, following the workers’ reported participation in protests against the continued closure.

The Commander said prosecutors had been directed to consider relisting them if evidence establishes a greater involvement in the alleged illegal activities.

With Stone Rockers maintaining that its closure is unlawful and the Mining Marshals insisting that the quarry is tied to an active criminal case, the dispute is increasingly one for the courts to settle rather than the court of public opinion.