You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles
YUMPU automatically turns print PDFs into web optimized ePapers that Google loves.
WWW.DAILYHERITAGE.COM.GH<br />
DAILY HERITAGE THURSDAY, <strong>FEBRUARY</strong> <strong>21</strong>, 2019<br />
03<br />
Pocket money for prosecution saga<br />
Armed robbers freed<br />
BY MUNTALLA INUSAH<br />
muntalla.inusah@dailyheritage.com.gh<br />
ADISTURBING development<br />
emerging from the corridors<br />
of the Ghana Police Service<br />
is that the peace officers are<br />
losing confidence in their<br />
own work following the continuous release<br />
of suspected criminals by various<br />
courts because “we do not have enough<br />
pocket money” to prosecute cases.<br />
The police prosecutors and investigators<br />
are worried that after working hard<br />
at their peril to arrest and arraign suspects,<br />
they are discharged on the technicality<br />
of want of prosecution.<br />
“We struggle to arrest armed robbers<br />
to the extent that sometimes our colleagues<br />
are killed in line of duty and<br />
when such a person is discharged on that<br />
technicality it demoralises us (police personnel),”<br />
a police prosecutor stated on<br />
condition of anonymity.<br />
“This directive of Disclosure of Documents<br />
introduced by the Chief Justice,<br />
which took effect from November 1, 2018,<br />
seems to have made the law flexible to<br />
the offender and some of the accused<br />
persons, when they are discharged, point<br />
fingers at us and sometimes warn us, because<br />
the person has been freed. Our<br />
pockets are also dry and nobody is giving<br />
us money to prosecute the cases.”<br />
Public confidence in police<br />
diminishing<br />
The prosecutors also lamented that their<br />
effort is being ridiculed by the public, who<br />
are “losing confidence in our system, and<br />
public confidence in the police is diminishing”.<br />
“If the public realises that the police<br />
have made arrests and the people are discharged,<br />
it makes them lose the trust in us.<br />
Some of these criminals are clever people<br />
and when they are discharged they go back<br />
and repeat similar acts and put the police in<br />
a more difficult position.<br />
“Some armed robbers have been discharged<br />
because the prosecution didn’t<br />
have money to file certain processes. We<br />
have evidence of the cases we bring to the<br />
court. At times when we arrest them at the<br />
police station level, they admit. They mention<br />
names of persons they work together<br />
with but when the police take the pain at<br />
their peril and arraign them, they are eventually<br />
discharged.”<br />
‘We’re fed up’<br />
It would be recalled that on Thursday,<br />
February 14, 2019, the DAILY HER-<br />
ITAGE, carried a story on its front page<br />
with the banner headline ‘We’re Fed Up,<br />
Police Prosecutors Cry Out, Warned More<br />
Criminals Would Be Freed’, which highlighted<br />
the facts that prosecutors handling<br />
cases on behalf of the state use<br />
their own pocket money to prepare to<br />
prosecute.<br />
The prosecutors, who are tasked by the<br />
• David Asante Apeatu, IGP<br />
Attorney General’s Department to prosecute<br />
criminal offence on behalf of the<br />
State, said they were “frustrated” and “fed<br />
up” with the continuous use of their<br />
“pocket monies” to provide services to the<br />
State.<br />
It is their case that with the introduction<br />
of Discovery of Documents in November<br />
2018 as per Article 19(2) (e) (g) of the 1992<br />
Constitution, police prosecutors and State<br />
Attorneys are mandated to make available<br />
relevant documents they intend to rely on<br />
to prosecute accused persons.<br />
They said since the introduction of the<br />
procedure on November 1, 2018 they have<br />
made several copies of documents with<br />
their “own pocket monies” and averred<br />
that the instance where they did not have<br />
money, they asked for unnecessary adjournments,<br />
a development that forces the<br />
courts to discharge accused persons “for<br />
want of prosecution.”<br />
The CJ’s directive, the source said, is<br />
that every police prosecutor, the judge or<br />
the magistrate, “before you commence<br />
prosecuting a criminal case, the prosecutors<br />
have to give you all statements of the witnesses.”<br />
Police, AG discussing modalities<br />
The Director-General of Public Affairs<br />
of the Ghana Police Service, ACP David<br />
Eklu, told the DAILY HERITAGE yesterday<br />
in a telephone interview that the<br />
matter had been discussed at management<br />
level and the Legal and Prosecuting Directorate<br />
had been tasked to come up with<br />
modalities for consideration.<br />
“That issue was discussed at management<br />
and the legal and prosecuting directorate<br />
was tasked to come out with various<br />
modalities to make it easier for those prosecutors<br />
to provide those documents to the<br />
other parties as per the Supreme Court decision.<br />
Asked if the modalities would include<br />
refunding the pocket monies to the prosecutors,<br />
ACP Eklu said “the possibilities include<br />
all those, but I don’t want to sound<br />
so certain that is what we are going to do,<br />
so I’m saying that we are looking at other<br />
modalities and all those are part of it (sic).”<br />
High Court affirms Mintah Ackaah<br />
BY MUNTALLA INUSAH<br />
muntalla.inusah@dailyheritage.com.gh<br />
THE PROBIT Division of the<br />
Accra High Court has thrown out<br />
an interlocutory injunction filed<br />
by Adams Addy and one another<br />
seeking a stay of execution of a<br />
High Court judgment declaring<br />
Solomon Mintah Ackaah as the<br />
legitimate Head of the Akwanor<br />
Royal Family of Ashalaja.<br />
The court presided over by<br />
Justice Doris Bempong ruled<br />
that,” upon hearing the arguments<br />
of both counsel on the questions<br />
of stay of execution, the court<br />
• As substantive Head of Nii Akwanor<br />
Royal Family of Ashalaja<br />
• Akwanor Royal Family invites investors<br />
was not convinced that the applicants<br />
have demonstrated any exceptional<br />
circumstances<br />
warranting the grant and have not<br />
shown they would suffer hardship<br />
if the application was not<br />
granted.”<br />
The application for interlocutory<br />
injunction was struck out as<br />
withdrawn and costs of GHc1,<br />
000 awarded in favour of Mintah<br />
Ackaah.<br />
Solomon Mintah Ackaah is legitimate<br />
Head of Akwanor Family<br />
The court, prior to dismissing<br />
the stay of execution, had declared<br />
on December 5, 2018 that<br />
Ackaah is the substantive Head of<br />
the Akwanor Royal Family and<br />
not Adams Addy.<br />
The court also declared that<br />
any acts done by defendants in<br />
their alleged capacity as joint<br />
heads of family are null and void.<br />
Justice Mrs Bempong also ordered<br />
the defendants to relinquish<br />
any assets of the Akwanor Royal<br />
Family that had come to them by<br />
reason of their holding themselves<br />
out as joint family heads.<br />
The defendants, the court said,<br />
are “perpetually restrained from<br />
holding themselves out as heads<br />
of the Akwanor Royal Family.<br />
Costs of GH¢8, 000 was awarded<br />
against the defendants.<br />
Plaintiff ’s claims<br />
In April 2014, Solomon<br />
Mintah Ackaah imitated an action<br />
against the defendants, Adams<br />
Addy and one other, seeking a<br />
declaration that the plaintiff is the<br />
substantive head of the Akwanor<br />
Royal Family.<br />
He also asked the court to declare<br />
that the defendants are not<br />
the heads of the Akwanor Royal<br />
Family and further asked the<br />
court to declare that any act or<br />
acts done by the defendants in the<br />
purported capacity as joint heads<br />
or head of the Akwanor Royal<br />
Family is null and void.<br />
Counter-claims<br />
Defendants, in their counterclaims<br />
filed in February 2017, also<br />
sought a deceleration that the defendants<br />
have always been the<br />
• CONTINUE ON PAGE 5