ABDULAI FUSENI v. REPUBLIC
2015
COURT OF APPEAL
GHANA
CORAM
- MARFUL-SAU, JA (PRESIDING)
- ACQUAYE, JA
- TORKORNOO, JA
Areas of Law
- Criminal Law and Procedure
2015
COURT OF APPEAL
GHANA
CORAM
AI Generated Summary
The appellant, along with four others, was convicted of conspiracy to commit robbery and robbery for attacking a livestock farmer, inflicting injuries on him, and stealing C144,800,000.00. The trial court sentenced all the convicts to 20 years IHL. The appellant appealed, arguing that the court failed to consider his individual role. However, the court held that each convict played a major role in the crime, and considering the factors for sentencing, dismissed the appeal. Previous cases and statutes confirmed that the sentence was appropriate given the violent nature of the crime.
MARFUL-SAU, JA: - The appellant in this appeal was charged together with four others on two counts of conspiracy to commit robbery and robbery contrary to sections 23(1) and 149 of the Criminal and Other Offences Act, 1960, Act 29 as amended by Act 646 of 2003. The appellant and the other convicts were tried by the Fast Track High Court, Accra and were all convicted and sentenced to 20 years IHL in a judgment delivered on the 20th July 2010. The appellant was the 3rd accused person at the trial and he has appealed against the sentence of 20 years imposed by the trial court.
The facts of the case upon which the appellant and the others were prosecuted was that the five convicts on or about 5th October, 2003 at about 1.00am attacked one Teye Ameko, a livestock farmer who owned herds of cattle and other animals in his village at Old Water Works near Akuse on the Kpong- Tema Motorway road. The said convicts who were armed with guns and cutlasses inflicted cutlass wound on Teye Ameko ,fired gun shots to scare people away from coming to the scene, and eventually ransacked the rooms of the victim and took away an amount of One Hundred and Forty-four Million, Eight Hundred Thousand old cedis (C144, 800,000.00). From the record of appeal, after the attack the victim bled profusely until he was rescued by his children and taken to the Akuse Government Hospital where he was referred to the Narh-Bita Hospital in Tema.
In his Notice of Appeal and written submissions to this court, counsel for the appellant main complaint against the sentence imposed by the trial court, is that, the court failed to consider the role played by each of the five convicts in the robbery and that if the court had done so, it would not have sentenced all the convicts to 20 years IHL. Counsel is therefore urging this court to review the record of appeal and evaluate the role played by each of the five convicts and render proportionate sentences to each. I have read the record of appeal carefully and I think that in the circumstances of this case each of the five convicts played major role in the execution of the robbery. The record is clear that when the then accused persons entered the house, they ordered the victim to bring out all his money, and subjected him to severe torture and beating because he responded that he had no money. When the victim became unconscious the 1st and 5th accused persons carried him to the bush behind his house to show where he had kept his money.
At this point