[1974]DLCA2303 • August 2, 1974 • Court of Appeal
OKORIE ALIAS OZUZU AND ANOTHER vs. THE REPUBLIC
The appellants were convicted of the murder of John Kwame Appiah based on circumstantial evidence and confessional statements by the second appellant. The prosecution's case relied heavily on these confessions and circumstantial evidence linking the appellants to the crime.
read moreCrabbe C.J. delivered the judgment of the court. The appellants were convicted before Okai J. at the criminal session of the High Court of Justice, Kumasi, Ashanti Region, on 4 August 1972, for the murder of John Kwame Appiah, and were sentenced to death. The case for the prosecution was based essentially on circumstantial evidence, and, with regard to the second appellant, the prosecution also relied on the confessional statements (exhibits A and K) made by the second appellant during the police investigations. In the opinion of this court, the circumstantial evidence was sufficiently cogent to justify the conviction of the appellants, and but for the very important constitutional issue raised in ground (i) of the additional grounds of appeal, filed on behalf of the second appellant, this court would have no difficulty whatsoever in dismissing the appeal, because it found no merit in the arguments advanced by counsel in support of the other grounds of appeal. Ground (1) is stat...