[1974]DLCA2242 • December 20, 1974 • Court of Appeal
ABUGIRI FRAFRA ALIAS PINI FRAFRA vs. THE REPUBLIC
The appellant, caretaker of a cocoa farm in Brong-Ahafo, was convicted of murdering Kwaku Oppong with a cutlass on 29 June 1971. The killing was sudden and without apparent reason. The appellant initially claimed to police that he killed because the deceased threatened him over an affair with the deceased's sister. At trial, he gave a different account involving insults, alleged poisoning attempts, and self-defense during a scuffle. The appellant also claimed a suicide attempt to explain his own neck wound. The jury was left to consider inconsistencies and defenses including accident, self-defense, and insanity.
read moreHe delivered the judgment of the court. The appellant, Abugiri Frafra alias Pini Frafra, was convicted of the murder of one Kwaku Oppong and sentenced to death. The act had no apparent reason. The appellant had been living at Pokukrom in the Brong-Ahafo Region where he was the caretaker of a cocoa farm owned by Kwadwo Nantwiri, an elder brother of the deceased. He attacked the deceased with a cutlass one afternoon while the deceased sat talking to his wife. There was one fatal wound on the neck which almost completely severed the head from the body. Death was instantaneous. That was on 29 June 1971. In a statement made by the appellant to the police the day after the incident he said he had killed the deceased because the deceased threatened to kill him for having had an affair with the deceased’s sister, Yaa Adoma. In evidence at his trial the appellant told a somewhat different story. That story was of insults heaped on him by the deceased and of a cigarette and food which he suspe.....