Victor Kojogah Adawudu, defence counsel for five of the 10 persons being tried for a coup plot related offence, has accused the arresting officers in the case of withholding a very important piece of evidence from the trial.
According to him, the arresting team took away a Close Circuit Television (CCTV) camera and its accessories that contained vital information on the sequence of event leading to the retrieval of weapons, including locally made guns and blacksmith tools, from the Citadel Hospital at Alajo in Accra.
The Hospital belongs to the first accused person (A1), Dr. Frederick Mac Palm, the alleged mastermind of the coup plot.
However, Mr. Adawudu told the Finance Division of the Accra High Court, presided over by Justice Afia Serwah Asare-Botwe, Justice Hafisata Amaleboba and Justice Stephen Oppong, yesterday, that the CCTV camera and its accessories implicated the arresting team, and that was why they had kept it away from the court.
The counsel, while cross-examining the 13th prosecution witness (PW13), who is the investigator in the case, Detective Chief Inspector Michael Nkrumah, accused the latter of hiding the CCTV camera because it exposed the arresting officers who planted the weapons on the premises of Citadel Hospital.
“You deliberately did not bring any footage [because] they have pieces of evidence implicating the arresting officers,” he alleged.
The prosecution witness responded that the accusation did not have any iota of truth, since there was no CCTV camera on the hospital premises, and as such, the arresting officers did not hand over any equipment of that nature to him.
But, Mr. Adawudu insisted that DC/Insp. Nkrumah had told the court earlier that the arresting officers gave him a CCTV camera and its accessories.
The witness maintained that the submission by the counsel was false, and explained that “after I went to check the list of item released to A1, and the exhibits before the court, I realised there was no CCTV camera and its accessories, and because of that, I withdraw the statement that [a] CCTV camera was given to me. When I checked my documents, I realised the CCTV camera was in relation to a different case, which I released to the owner, Sylvester Owusu Bempah.”
PW13 also told the court that when he realised one of Mr. Adawudu’s clients, who is the blacksmith among the group, Kafui Donya, aka Ezor (A2), had finished his work and might depart back to Alavanyo in the Volta Region, the investigation team deliberately sent a faulty revolver for him to repair.
He said the idea was to delay him, and that [the] faulty revolver is part of the exhibits before the court.”
Mr. Adawudu also stated that the accusation that Dr. Frederick Mac Palm, Kafui Donya and the 3rd prosecution witness (PW3), Sulley Awarf, went to the military shooting range at Teshie to test fire and were arrested by the Southern Command was a ruse, because there was no evidence, in terms of statements, or fingerprints taken from them.
The witness refused the suggestion by the counsel and indicated that although no statement or fingerprint report was handed to him by the Military Police, the accused persons, together with Sergeant Awarf, had admitted the offence.
DW13 further told the court that the investigation team did not submit any extract from three techno mobile phones retrieved from Dr. Frederick Mac Palm, Bright Alan Debrah (A3) and Corporal Sylvester Akanpenwan to the court, because there was nothing of evidential purposes that were found on these phones.
He added that Dr. Frederick Mac Palm was using a medical outreach as modus operandi to galvanise support for Take Action Ghana (TAG) from the people and to accept them, when they succeed in toppling the government.
Nonetheless, the counsel said, the assertion was not true, and stressed that TAG was used for a medical outreach.
The 10 accused persons are Dr. Frederick Mac Palm, Kafui Donya, Bright Alan Debrah, Johannes Zikpi, Colonel Samuel Gameli, WOII Esther Saan, Corporal Solomon Abubaka, Corporal Sylvester Akanpewon, and Assistant Commissioner Police (ACP) Benjamin Agordzo.
