Try asking the following...
Try asking the following...
November 25, 1963
HIGH COURT
GHANA
CORAM
JUDGMENT OF APALOO J.
The accused is charged with intentionally and unlawfully causing harm to Osei Kwadwo by means of an offensive weapon. The complainant is an elderly man who is obviously about seventy years of age. His dignified bearing in court points to the fact that he is a respectable and well-respected man in his home. He comes from Kona, a town about fifteen miles from Mampong, Ashanti. He is a Methodist by persuasion and is one of the elders of that Church. For his living, he works as the cashier of the Farmers' Council at Kona.
The evidence shows that members of the Methodist Church by habit hold evening religious service on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and I think this fact is well known at Kona. As one of the adherents of that church, the complainant regularly attends these evening services. I find that about 7.00 p.m. or thereabouts on the 19th June this year, the complainant left his house for the church. The Methodist Church is a stone's throw from his house. When he reached the precincts of the church, he realised that devotional worship was already in progress. I find that the complainant then got ready to enter the church. But before he could do this, he was suddenly slashed from behind by a man who obviously used a sharp cutlass. He sustained what Dr. Obiri described as a deep lacerated wound which commenced from the right side of the neck and stretched to the back. He raised an alarm instinctively and fell into the church. He bled so profusely that he soon lapsed into unconsciousness.
In this condition, he was put in a taxi cab and rushed to the Central Hospital, Kumasi. So much did he bleed that neither his pulse nor blood pressure could be recorded when he got to the hospital. He was soon put [p.458] under anaesthesia and received blood transfusion and other surgical treatment. But for this, the complainant's death, would by now, have been stale news. Although he has been discharged from hospital, he has lost the complete use of his right arm. He cannot now flex or extend the arm below the elbow arm or raise his right arm without assistance. When he gave evidence on the 19th November, his right arm was in sling. There can be little doubt that whoever caused the injuries to the complainant did so extremely savagely.
The prosecution claimed that it was the accused who inflicted the injuries on the complainant. This, the latter vehemently denied. The prosecution of course assumes the onus of establishing that it was the accuse
AI Generated Summary
Justice Apaloo convicted the accused of intentionally and unlawfully causing grievous harm to Osei Kwadwo near the Methodist Church at Kona, Ashanti. The court found that at about 7:30 p.m. on 19 June, as Kwadwo approached worship, he was suddenly slashed from behind with a sharp cutlass, sustaining a deep laceration from his neck to his back and later losing use of his right arm. Multiple witnesses—including his son Osei Kwasi, Yaw Tawiah, Ama Kyaa, and Afua Fanti—heard Kwadwo call the accused’s name and placed the accused at the church, where he was seen running away. The accused’s alibi was rejected; Constable Broni discovered his cutlass wet and seemingly newly washed, supporting an inference of incriminating staining. Motive was supported by prior hostility over a cocoa farm settlement. Interpreting "offensive weapon" functionally under the Criminal Code, the court held a cutlass qualifies and convicted accordingly.