[1959]DLCA2055 • May 1, 1959 • Court of Appeal
REGINA vs. OJOJO
The appellant was convicted of murder by a jury at the Assizes in Cape Coast. The appellant admitted killing the deceased but claimed provocation and self-defence, alleging he was provoked by words and threatened with a cutlass by the deceased. The trial judge's summing up was challenged for misdirecting the jury and treating the appellant's statement as a confession of murder without properly considering the defences raised.
read moreThe appellant was convicted on the 11th December, 1958 before Bossman J., sitting with a jury at the Assizes holden at Cape Coast, upon a charge of murder. He has appealed to this Court against his conviction. (His lordship stated the facts, and proceeded:-) The notes of the Judge’s summing-up attracted our attention, and we granted leave to appeal. When the appeal came on for hearing we asked learned Crown Counsel for the respondent whether he could be of any assistance to the Court even before hearing counsel for the appellant. He readily agreed, and conceded (properly, in our view) that the Judge’s summing-up fell so far short of what the law required that he could not support the conviction. We are of the opinion that although the learned Judge took meticulous care in his summing-up in explaining the law of murder to the jury, and also in recapitulating the evidence for the prosecution, he unfortunately misdirected himself, both by actual misdirection and by non-direction, ...