THE REPUBLIC v. MARY COLEMAN-PAITTO
2022
COURT OF APPEAL
GHANA
CORAM
- ADJEI, J.A
- MENSAH, J.A
- KOOMSON, JA
Areas of Law
- Criminal Law and Procedure
- Civil Procedure
- Constitutional Law
2022
COURT OF APPEAL
GHANA
CORAM
AI Generated Summary
On 26 June 2018, the Criminal Division of the High Court in Accra refused to take the Respondent’s plea, struck out a charge sheet, and discharged the Respondent after learning that title to 89, 4th Ringway Estate, Osu, Accra was the subject of civil litigation before another High Court. The Republic, through the Attorney-General, sought and eventually obtained leave to appeal and validly filed its notice of appeal on 3 December 2020. In a judgment authored by Dennis Adjei, JA, the Court of Appeal held that the trial court’s termination of the prosecution was a wrong decision on a question of law: pending civil proceedings do not preclude or postpone criminal prosecutions. The Court traced the now obsolete Smith v Selwyn rule and reaffirmed Ghanaian authority in Agbosu v Kotey, and emphasized Article 88(3) vesting criminal prosecution in the Attorney-General. The appeal was allowed, the ruling set aside, and the case recommended for transfer to a differently constituted High Court for trial.
ADJEI,J.A:
The Criminal Division of the High Court Accra on 26th June, 2018 struck out the criminal charge preferred against the Accused Person and discharged him on grounds that the matter is a civil one pending before the High Court differently constituted and could not metamorphose into a criminal matter. The Republic dissatisfied with the ruling of the High Court filed an application for enlargement of time to file an appeal against the said ruling. The Court of Appeal granted leave to the Republic to file an appeal against the ruling of the trial High Court on 26th May, 2020 , however, the Republic failed to file the appeal within the terms of the order made by the Court and filed it out of time. The Court of Appeal struck out the appeal filed outside the time granted by it as void. The Court of Appeal on 30th November, 2020 granted further leave to the Republic to file its notice of appeal against the ruling of the High Court delivered on 26th June, 2018 within seven days from that date.
The Republic on 3rd December, 2020 validly filed its notice of appeal against the said ruling of the High Court to the Court of Appeal. The Republic/Appellant shall for the purposes of this appeal be referred to as the Appellant, and the Accused/Appellant shall be referred to in this appeal as Respondent.
The facts of the case are that the Appellant preferred two counts of offence against the Respondent before the Criminal Division of the High Court. The offences were forgery of document contrary to section 159 of the Criminal Offences Act, 1960 (Act 29) , and defrauding by false pretences contrary to section 131 of the Criminal Offences Act, 1960 (Act 29). The Respondent was accused for transferring ownership of the building with No. 89 , 4th Ringway Estate, Osu Accra into her name when the original acquirer of the property, the late Kofi Coleman Paitto had on 14th August, 1991 gifted to his second daughter Philippa Taylor Coleman- Paitoo who had since become deceased.
The counsel for the Respondent before the trial High Court informed the Court that the matter was a subject matter of civil litigation before the High Court differently constituted and the criminal matter should be truncated. The High Court refused to take the plea of the accused on hearing that the property whose title deeds the Respondent is alleged to have forged is a subject matter of a litigation before the High Court. The High Court Judge struck out the charge sheet and discharged the Respon