2 Jailed For Threatening To Kill Footballer

A Carpenter and a stone cracker have been jailed by an Accra Circuit Court after being found guilty of threatening to kill a footballer.

The accused persons, Nii Ayitey Sheriff, a carpenter and Ayuba Sarkodie, a stone cracker, had been charged with conspiracy to commit crime and robbery after they took a laptop belonging to the footballer, Koomson Graham, who they had asked for money.

The trial judge, Francis Obiri, had the charges changed to conspiracy to commit crime, and threat of death because they wielded cutlasses and threatened to kill the complainant.

He said the charges did not exactly fall under robbery and proceeded to jail them based on the two charges.

Obiri handed them 10 years each for each offence and said both sentences should run concurrently.

Presenting the facts of the case, the prosecuting officer, Chief Superintendent Duuti Tuaruka, said the accused persons had been harassing residents of Gbawe and Gomtse persistently.

He said on February 28, 2012 the complainant who was in the company of a friend called Koemah Samuel Kwaku, was carrying a Toshiba laptop while walking along a road at Gomtse. According to him, the suspects suddenly emerged from a nearby bush wielding cutlasses, chisels and hacksaw blade, and asked the two friends to surrender their money or be killed.

The police officer said the footballer and his friends did not have much money on them so they pleaded with the suspects to take the GHC5 they had, but they ignored them and instead snatched the laptop of the footballer and disappeared into the bush.

In addition, he stated that the complainant consequently went to the Gomtse chief�s palace to report the matter. The chief did not hesitate to organize some youth in the area who arrested the suspects.

The prosecutor noted that the suspects admitted the offence in the caution statements and were afterwards arraigned.

Source: Daily Guide