SAGAH AGBODZAVU v. REPUBLIC
2015
COURT OF APPEAL
GHANA
CORAM
- ADJEI, J.A. (PRESIDING)
- SOWAH, J.A.
- KWOFIE, J.A
Areas of Law
- Criminal Law and Procedure
- Evidence Law
- Constitutional Law
2015
COURT OF APPEAL
GHANA
CORAM
AI Generated Summary
This case involves an appeal against a murder conviction. The appellant, a fetish priest, was convicted of murdering a 10-year-old boy and sentenced to death. The Court of Appeal reviewed the case and found several issues with the trial proceedings, including the improper admission of a confession statement, misdirections and non-directions by the trial judge, and failure to properly investigate the appellant's alibi. The court determined that these errors occasioned a miscarriage of justice. As a result, the appeal was allowed, and the conviction was set aside. The case highlights important principles in criminal law and procedure, particularly regarding the handling of confession statements, expert evidence, and the defence of alibi.
ADJEI,J.A:
This appeal is against the judgment of the High Court, Koforidua delivered on 19th July, 2001. The jurors unanimously found the accused person (the Appellant herein) guilty of murder and were sentenced to suffer death.
The brief undisputed facts of this case were that one Amos Gadzo, then ten years, was murdered at the outskirts of Adakope village on 6th December, 2007. A search party scoured the bush at Adakope village for three days but could not find the body. Later on libation was poured by the accused person who is a fetish priest after which he proceeded with three other people to the bush to search for the deceased person. The Appellant and the other three people found the body of Amos Gadzo decapitated at the outskirts of Adakope village. The accused person and his team who found the body of Amos Gadzo were arrested by the police.
The Appellant confessed to the commission of the crime with Agbanu Raphael alias Tselko, Kosivi Galino and Kwadwo Kubadjev, that is the other members of his search party. The Appellant in his confession statement stated that he and the aforementioned persons conspired to murder the deceased. The deceased went to the bush to cut Nim trees and they followed him, gripped him, put him on the ground, snatched his cutlass and used it to decapitate him. They did not take any part of the deceased body, but they abandoned the body in the bush.
At the end of the trial, the jury found the accused person guilty of murder. The Appellant dissatisfied with the verdict of the High Court filed a petition of appeal against it to this Court. The four grounds of appeal set out in the petition of appeal filed on 11th August, 2011 are as follows:
“1. That the verdict of the jury cannot be supported having regard to the evidence.
2. That the trial Judge erred in law when he admitted an alleged confession statement in the face of conflicting evidence from the Prosecution as to the language in which the alleged statement was given as it offends the standard set by section 120 of NRCD 323.
3. The trial Judge misdirected the jury on the accused alibi which as the evidence showed was not investigated at all.
4. That the prosecution failed to call material witnesses whose evidence would have tilted the case either way but the trial Judge did not adequately direct the jury on the issues”.
We shall address the ground 1 of appeal, which is to the effect that the judgment of the jurors is unreasonable having regard to the evidence