A Lagos Coroner’s Court has ordered the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital and the Lagos State DNA and Forensic Centre to produce an autopsy report and DNA test result within 21 days that could help determine whether an unidentified body tagged No. 1385, held in the Infectious Disease Hospital mortuary in Yaba, belongs to journalist Pelumi Onifade, who disappeared while covering the EndSARS protests in October 2020.

Investigating Magistrate Temitope Oladele issued the orders during the resumed inquest into Onifade’s death, following an application by counsel to the journalist’s family and Media Rights Agenda, Alimi Adamu, who urged the court to compel LASUTH to release the autopsy report and to obtain the DNA analysis results from the forensic centre.

Adamu told the court that a previous order directing the Chief Medical Director of Yaba General Hospital to report on the body’s whereabouts had resulted in LASUTH disclosing that the body was not at Yaba General Hospital as earlier believed but had been transferred to the IDH mortuary, and that autopsies had already been conducted on six bodies brought to the hospital on November 3, 2020, including body No. 1385. DNA samples collected during those autopsies, as well as reference samples obtained from families of those lost during the protests, had been forwarded to the Lagos State DNA and Forensic Centre.

The magistrate confirmed the existence of the autopsy report from LASUTH’s March 24, 2026, document from its Department of Pathology and Forensic Medicine and ordered it forwarded to the court within 21 days. She also directed the DNA and Forensic Centre director to submit the result of the DNA test relating to body No. 1385 within the same period. The matter was adjourned to June 23 for continuation.

The inquest was ordered by Justice Ayokunle Olayinka Faji of the Federal High Court in Lagos on July 19, 2024, following a wrongful death suit filed by Media Rights Agenda against the Nigeria Police Force and the Lagos State Government over the circumstances of Onifade’s death. Onifade, a reporter with Gboah TV, was reportedly arrested by police attached to a Lagos State Task Force while covering the protests, and his body was later discovered at the Ikorodu General Hospital mortuary.