AMLALO vs. THE REPUBLIC [1978]DLCA1127

Date	1978-05-18
Suit No.
Citation No.	[1978]DLCA1127

ANIN JA

ANNAN JA

FRANCOIS J.A.

J. REINDORF FOR THE APPELLANT.

J. BAMFORD-ADDO (MRS.) AND CREPPY PRINCIPAL STATE ATTORNEYS FOR THE REPUBLIC.

[1978]DLCA1127
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													<main id="main" class="content" style="min-height: 60rem" >AMLALO <o:p></o:p>vs. <o:p></o:p>THE REPUBLIC<o:p></o:p>[COURT OF APPEAL, ACCRA] <o:p></o:p>[1979] GLR 162<o:p></o:p><div style="mso-element:para-border-div;border:none;border-bottom:solid windowtext 1.5pt;
padding:0in 0in 1.0pt 0in">

DATE:
18 MAY 1978<o:p></o:p>

</div>COUNSEL:&nbsp;&nbsp; <o:p></o:p><div style="mso-element:para-border-div;border:none;border-bottom:solid windowtext 1.5pt;
padding:0in 0in 0in 0in">

J. REINDORF FOR THE APPELLANT.<o:p></o:p>

</div>CORAM:
<o:p></o:p><div style="mso-element:para-border-div;border:none;border-bottom:solid windowtext 1.5pt;
padding:0in 0in 0in 0in">

ANIN, ANNAN AND FRANCOIS JJ.A.<o:p></o:p>

</div><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p>JUDGMENT OF ANIN J.A.<o:p></o:p>Anin J.A.
delivered the judgment of the court. The villagers of Ekeyeamezor near Axim
woke up in the morning of 8 September 1974 to discover pilfering among their
backyard poultry. Not unnaturally their suspicion fell on two persons, Avor
Kojo and Kofi Takyi, who had acquired considerable notoriety in that little
community for stealing poultry. On this occasion, the real evidence of an
abandoned trap and chicken feathers strewn higgledy-piggledy in a compound
convinced the simple village-folk of the stealthy nocturnal trapping of their
fowl and the clandestine consumption of the booty by the suspects. Upon the
discovery of the theft, the appellant and his brother Kofi Ahele lost no time
in challenging and quarrelling with Kofi Takyi and Avor Kojo respectively.<o:p></o:p><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p>In the
trial at the Sekondi High Court, the prosecution relied on the evidence of two
persons who claimed to be eye-witnesses of this quarrel. The first witness,
Samuel Quarm, described how the appellant and his brother openly accused Kofi
Takyi and Avor Kojo of theft and then insisted that they produce the missing
fowl or else face the consequences. On being rebuffed by the suspects’ the
appellant retrieved a trap from the suspects, house. Kofi Takyi immediately
struggled with the appellant to snatch the trap from him; and this struggle
escalated into a quarrel between the two of them. Simultaneously, the
appellant’s brother, Kofi Ahele, engaged the second suspect Avor Kojo in a
fight. According to both prosecution witnesses, the appellant “cut Takyi’s face
with a cutlass and pushed him down and gave him another cut at the back of the
neck.” On being called by his step-mother, the appellant bolted away from the
scene.<o:p></o:p><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p>The
testimony of the second eye-witness, Joseph Anoma Kwame, corroborated that of
the first in all essentials; the only discrepancy being that while the first
witness stated that the appellant at the commencement of the quarrel held a
cutlass in his right hand; the second witness for his part swore to seeing the
cutlass in the appellant’s left hand. Both in the court below and in this court
much capital was made by defence counsel about this discrepancy in the
testimony of the two eye-witnesses. However, in the circumstances of this case
we do not find this discrepancy to be material. The inescapable fact is that
both witnesses swore to seeing the appellant slash his victim twice with the
cutlass. Their accounts tallied, not only on the number of cuts inflicted by
the appellant on his victim, but also on the exact location of the cuts. There
was no suggestion made of the improbability of either witness having been
present at the scene of the quarrel; neither were these eye-witnesses
discredited in any way.<o:p></o:p><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p>Detective
Sergeant Darkey, who was in charge of the investigation of the case, recounted
his visit to the locus in quo where he saw blood stains on the ground and
retrieved an iron trap (exhibit A). In the course of his search of the
vicinity, he discovered the butchered body of the deceased Kofi Takyi in a pit
latrine about 45 yards from the scene of the struggle. It was covered with
wounds and big cuts, noticeably at the back of the neck, on the right side of
the face and on the left knee. With the help of other policemen, he retrieved
the corpse and sent it to Axim Hospital for autopsy conducted by Dr. Godwill
Odame.<o:p></o:p>Dr. Odame
testified that:<o:p></o:p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:5.0pt;
margin-left:.5in;text-align:justify;mso-pagination:none;border:none;mso-padding-alt:
31.0pt 31.0pt 31.0pt 31.0pt;mso-border-shadow:yes">“The
deceased was a young man aged about 25 years, and was about 5 ft. in height. On
the deceased were deep multiple lacerations. Dissection of the head revealed a
deep cut on the right side of the face and the head was almost cut off. The cut
was on the right side of the neck. The right leg was almost amputated.
Dissection of the other parts of the body was not done because there was no
indication of any other cause of death. The cause of death of the victim: It
was due to acute haemorrhage shock resulting from the almost decapitated head
and the amputated leg. It was an unnatural cause of death.”<o:p></o:p><o:p>&</main>