Republic Vrs Joseph Ampadu [2023] GHACC 266 (24 March 2023)

IN THE CIRCUIT COURT ‘1’, ADENTAN, ACCRA, BEFORE HER HONOUR JUDGE DORA G. A. INKUMSAH ESHUN (MRS.) SITTING ON FRIDAY THE 24th DAY OF MARCH 2023 SUIT NO: D6/12/2021 THE REPUBLIC V. JOSEPH AMPADU VERDICT The accused person is a 50-year-old painter who was arraigned before the court on 31st March 2021 on one count of defilement of a child under sixteen years of age, contrary to section 101(2) of the Criminal and Other Offences Act, 1960 (Act 29). The accused person pleaded “not guilty” to the charge, was granted bail in the sum of GH¢20,000 with two sureties who should be known to the police and ordered to report to the investigator twice a week at the Madina Domestic Violence and Victims Support Unit (DOVVSU). The victim, a seven-year-old child, was granted an interim protection order that day. In the brief facts, the investigator, Detective P. W. Inspector Anastasia Fosu, stated that the complainant, Dorcia Bimpong is a trader who stays at Kwabenya with her daughter, the victim. In October 2020, the complainant rented a room at Kwabenya with the assistance of the accused person who is also an agent and employed his services to paint the room. Thereafter, the complainant and accused person became friends and the accused person visited the complainant often. On one such visit, the complainant left the victim with the accused person while she went to buy food for the victim. The facts state that when the complainant left, the accused person instructed the victim to lie down on the floor and remove her panties. Then he pulled his shorts down to his knees, removed his penis from his boxer shorts and had sexual intercourse with the victim. The accused person warned the victim not to tell the complainant what happened. On 19th 1 February 2021, the complainant had information in town that the accused person’s son had sexually abused a girl in the neighbourhood. Since the boy was close to the victim, she became alarmed and interviewed her child after she returned from school. The victim then revealed to her that it was rather the accused person who had sexual intercourse with her some months ago. Madam Dorcia filed a complaint with the Madina DOVVSU where a police medical report form was issued to her to send the victim to the hospital for an examination. The accused person was arrested and charged with the offence after investigations. Section 154 of the Criminal and Other Offences Procedure Act, 1960 (Act 29) states, (1) “Where a person is charged with an offence consisting of several particulars, a combination of some, only of which constitutes a complete lesser offence, and the combination is proved, but the remaining particulars are not proved, that person may be convicted of the lesser offence although not charged with it. (2) Where a person is charged with an offence and facts are proved which reduce it to a lesser offence, that person may be convicted of the lesser offence although not charged with it.” After the close of the prosecution’s case, the court found on 28th January 2022 that the evidence presented was such that a reasonable tribunal could not convict the accused person on the charge of defilement contrary to section 101(2) of Act 29, as there was no evidence that the accused person penetrated the victim. However, the court found that the prosecution had made a prima facie case sufficient for the accused person to answer on the charge of indecent assault, contrary to section 103(1) of Act 29. The accused person was therefore ordered to open his defence under sections 154 and 174(1) of the Criminal and Other Offences Procedure Act, 1960 (Act 30) and was reminded of his right to remain silent, make a statement from the dock or give evidence on oath. In section 177(1) of the Criminal and Other Offences Procedure Act, 1960 (Act 30), “The court, having heard the totality of the evidence shall consider and determine the whole matter and may, 2 (a) convict the accused and pass sentence on, or make an order against the accused according to law, or (b) acquit the accused, and the Court shall give its decision in the form of an oral judgment, and shall record the decision briefly together with the reasons for it, where necessary.” [Hausa v. The Republic [1981] GLR 840]. In section 103(1) of Act 29, “A person who indecently assaults another person commits a misdemeanour and is liable on conviction to a term of imprisonment of not less than six months”. The offence of indecent assault is defined in section 103(2) of Act 29: “A person commits the offence of indecent assault if, without the consent of the other person, that person, (a) forcibly makes any sexual bodily contact with the other person, or (b) sexually violates the body of the other person”. In The State v. Gyimah [1963] 2 GLR 446, it was held that “Indecent assault is an alternative verdict which the court can consider where it is not satisfied that penetration had taken place.”1 The issue the court must resolve is whether the accused person has raised a reasonable doubt that he, (a) forcibly made any sexual bodily contact with, or (b) sexually violated the body of, the victim. The prosecution called three witnesses, a) Madam Dorcia Bimpong, the complainant, 1 Thomica Akua Nyhira Gyanfa, the alleged victim, and 2 Det. Insp. Anastasia Fosu, the investigator (PW3). The investigator tendered the following documents: 3 1. The investigation caution statement of the accused person dated 19th March 2021 (Exhibits A and A1). 2. The charged caution statement of the accused person dated 22nd March 2021 (Exhibits B and B1). 3. Section A and B of the Police Medical Form (Exhibits C and C1). 4. A photocopy of the biodata page of the weighing book of the victim (Exhibit D) which states her date of birth as 26th June 2013, making her 8 years 7 months as of January 28, 2022. The following people gave evidence for the defence; 1. Joseph Ampadu, also known as “Wofa Atta”, the accused person, 2. Michael Asamoah, a neighbour to the parties (DW1), and 3. Grace Ewusie Asamoah, another neighbour to the parties (DW2). The accused person and his witnesses did not tender any documents in evidence. Madam Dorcia Bimpong, the complainant (PW1), testified that she relocated to her residence at Kwabenya on 4th October 2020. One Wofa Atta, who stays in the victim’s father’s family house painted her room. Thereafter, they became friends, and he would bring foodstuff and money to her until her fiancé came to live with her in December 2020 – then he stopped visiting her. On February 19, 2021, at about 9 am, when PW1 went to fetch water in the neighbourhood, someone drove a car at top speed and the people around started complaining. A woman said the driver of the vehicle was Frank, Wofa Atta’s son, a bad boy who had sexually abused someone in the area. This scared PW1 because her daughter played with and was close to him when they moved to the area, Frank lived with his father Wofa Atta in the victim’s father’s family house. When the victim returned from school, PW1 interviewed her, and it was then that she revealed that Wofa Atta used his penis to brush her vagina in their room. A relative advised PW1 to send the child for treatment and the medical officer advised her to report the matter to the police. 4 PW1 admitted in cross-examination that it has been a year since the incident. When the accused person denied having sex with the victim, PW1 said the doctor confirmed that it was true the accused slept with her daughter. The accused person put it to PW1 that she colluded with the doctors to write a report that he had defiled the victim. PW1 responded that although she did not know the accused was having sex with the victim, she could say she saw it, because the victim started complaining of pain in her vagina, especially when she urinated. She spoke to her Northern friend who told her that her daughter had probably eaten something to cause that pain so she should let her sit in hot water and give her a boiled mixture of pepper, hwentia and ginger to drink, to heal the wounds in her vagina. The accused person put it to PW1 that she had told the victim to agree when people asked if he had done something to her. PW1 denied this and said the victim told the doctor what happened. The accused person put it to PW1 that she would invite him into her room, run her hands all over her body and ask him to sleep with her but because he refused, she said she would tell her daughter “…something to put on” him. This was furiously denied by PW1. The accused person also put it to PW1 that she told her daughter to say many things and reported him because she asked him to give her money and he stopped giving it to her. PW1 denounced him as a liar and stated that she works and sells clothes – the accused person cannot maintain her. PW1 said the accused person would come to her house and buy the victim biscuit and Fanta to prevent her from telling PW1 what happened. The accused person also told the victim he would beat her if she revealed the incident, and she was afraid. One Friday morning, when the victim went to school and she went to fetch water, Frank, the accused person’s son, drove a car in such a way that he could have run over someone. The woman selling banana whom he almost run over said he is a bad boy – he slept with someone’s daughter, but they pleaded for him because of his father. PW1 testified that she panicked because the accused person’s son and her daughter usually played together in her in-law’s home, where she rented her room. When she got home, her mind was not at ease while she was washing her clothes. She asked herself whether the accused person’s son had 5 done the same thing to her daughter and had told her not to tell PW1, since she was complaining of pain in her vagina. The accused person put it to PW1 that the victim came to him at home and told him everything she reported was not true – she was defiled long before they came to the area. He has lived in the area for 20 years and everyone knows he cannot do such a thing. PW1 claimed her daughter runs away when she sees the accused person. The prosecutor interjected here that the accused person had remained in the vicinity of PW1’s residence, despite the protection order preventing him from going near the victim. The accused person countered that he moved to stay at ACP GBC at Ashongman after the protection order. When asked why she reported the accused person to the police when she suspected the accused person’s son, PW1 testified that she did not suspect the accused person could do that to her child. She demanded that the victim tell the truth about whether Frank had slept with her when she returned from school, or else she would beat her. PW1 recounted what she heard when she went to fetch water and the victim denied that Frank had ever done that to her but said it was “Wofa Atta”. The day he painted the house, she was hungry, and he bought her rice. While they were watching TV, Wofa Atta asked her to sit on his lap and she refused. He pulled her down on the carpet, pulled her knicker shorts down to her knees and pulled his shorts down. Then he rubbed his penis against her vagina until water came out of his penis. PW1 testified that she cried after hearing this because she did not believe Wofa Atta would do that. She scolded the victim who insisted Frank had done nothing to her. PW1 identified “Wofa Atta” as the accused person and testified that she informed her mother-in-law’s older sister who said she would ask the accused person about it – if he told the truth, they would sit down to resolve the issue. When the accused person was called, he denied the allegation, so everyone thought she was lying. That is why she took the victim to the hospital. There, the doctor confirmed that the accused used his penis to brush the victim’s vagina and asked PW1 to report it to the police and bring back the 6 police medical form. This is what led to the arrest of the accused person who was brought to PW1’s home with three policemen in handcuffs to demonstrate what he did to the child. The police asked the victim how it happened, and she said she was lying down. The accused was asked what happened – he stated that he sat in a chair and took out his penis but the investigator told him that is not what he said at the police station so he should demonstrate what happened properly. The accused then removed his penis and lay on the victim who got scared and the accused person was asked to get up. A video was taken of the demonstration. The investigator, (PW3), Detective Inspector Anastasia Fosu testified through her witness statement that the case was referred to her on 23rd February 2021 at 8 am, when PW1 came with the victim to the Madina DOVVSU to report that the accused person used his penis to brush the vagina of the victim. Statements were taken from PW1 and PW2 after a medical report was issued and returned. Evidence of the child’s age was collected and PW3 visited the crime scene with the complainant, victim and accused person where the victim demonstrated how the accused instructed the victim to lie on the floor, removed her pant and used his penis to brush her vagina until he ejaculated. The accused person also demonstrated how he used his penis to brush the surface of the victim’s vagina while he was kneeling in front of her, and she was standing. Thereafter, the accused person was charged with the offence. The only question posed by the accused person to PW3 was whether all that she wrote in her witness statement is everything there is in the matter, and she responded in the affirmative. The victim, a Class One pupil (PW2), testified in her witness statement that sometime ago last year, Wofa Atta came to visit her mother in the morning. When her mother left the house to buy rice for her, Wofa Atta who was watching television asked her to lie on the floor, and she obeyed. He removed the shorts she was wearing to her knee level and opened her legs widely. He pulled down his shorts, removed his penis from his boxer shorts and used his penis to brush her vagina until water came out of his penis. Some of the water fell on her shorts and his shorts. He did not insert his penis into her vagina. Afterwards, he warned the victim not to tell her mother – otherwise he would beat her. He 7 bought soda for her later and she did not tell her mother because she was afraid that her mother would beat her. In cross-examination the victim gave the following testimony when the accused person asked her what happened when he came to paint her house, “Please when he came to paint our room for us, I was watching TV. So please when he finished, he called me and asked me to come. He asked me to come and sit on him and he put me down. He took off my knicker and he also removed his knicker. He used his pee pee to rub my vagina. When he finished, there was water coming. Some of the water stained my knicker and some of the water stained his knicker. So, after he finished, he buy soda biscuit for me.” The accused person denied buying soda biscuit for the child. When the accused person put it to PW2 that after painting, he left a message with her for her mother when she returned and left for his house, the victim countered that he was lying. She testified under re- examination that her mother went to buy rice for her at the material time the accused assaulted her. Her mother returned to meet the accused person, but she did not tell her mother because Wofa Atta told her that if she “did not know” and told her mother, he would beat her. The accused said he was sent by the police to the complainant’s home where he and the child were asked to demonstrate how he “had sex” with her. According to the accused person, he was forced to make a demonstration of how he allegedly defiled the victim, and the police took a video of the demonstration. The court must note here that the procedure employed by the police by engaging the accused person and the victim in a role play to confirm the alleged incident is liable to cause re-traumatization for a victim of sexual violence. Dr. Haskall and Dr. Randall, in a report on adult victims of sexual violence submitted to Justice Canada, noted; “Victims’ experiences of disclosing sexual assault to police or others is key to the investigation as well as to their recovery. As such, it is essential that police receive disclosures respectfully and patiently, in a way that empowers the victim. Professionals in the criminal justice system must receive specialized trauma-informed training in this area.”2 8 It has been noted that police standard interrogation practices and scepticism towards victims interfere with victim interviews. Standard interrogation practices were made for offenders and not victims and reflect a position of doubt and suspicion. The investigator’s attitude towards a sexual assault victim can affect the information the victim gives them and ultimately the outcome of the case. [Haskell, L & Randall M. (2019; 26)]. “Insufficiently trained police can contribute to assaulted women experiencing secondary victimization. If victims feel unsafe when questioned, they may not be able to use their prefrontal cortex to understand the questions and retrieve certain memories. If victims feel traumatized by the questioning, it may trigger the retrieval of fragmentary sensations and emotions that are nearly as intense as those they experienced during the assault itself. Also, poor memory retrieval is associated with high levels of stress and high arousal, which in turn is associated with the prefrontal cortex being threatened.” [Haskell, L & Randall M. (2019; 26)]. These findings are likely to have an even more pronounced effect on child sexual assault victims. It is for this reason that law enforcement and justice delivery professionals in the United States and other parts of the world are applying the “Start by Believing” method developed by End Violence Against Women International in sexual assault cases. The Start by Believing campaign was launched to, “…change the way society responds to sexual assault. It is based on decades of research documenting that disclosures by sexual assault victims often elicit responses of doubt and blame, rather than compassion and support. These negative reactions have a number of detrimental effects on victims, and their harmful impact compounds as the number of negative reactions increases. Indeed, research documents that negative reactions are worse than no reaction at all, in terms of their impact on sexual assault victims. They can even increase a survivor’s risk of sexual assault revictimization in the future. Negative reactions also decrease the likelihood that victims will report their sexual assault to police or access other community services. One of the primary reasons for this is because victims fear how 9 others will respond, and this fear is very well grounded, as professionals as well as loved ones often do react in harmful ways.”3 The Start by Believing philosophy creates an environment in which a victim can freely tell their story without fear of bias or re-victimization. Adopting this method would assist the police to gather all the necessary information and guide their investigation to proffer accurate and just charges. PW1, PW2 and PW3 all testified that the accused brushed his penis against the victim’s vagina, which is indicative of indecent assault, yet the accused was charged with defilement, which is the natural or unnatural carnal knowledge of the victim, indicative of penetration. On 28th January 2022, the court ordered the accused person to open his defence on the offence of indecent assault contrary to section 103(1) of Act 29. The standard of proof in a criminal trial includes the burden of persuasion and the burden of producing evidence [sections 10 and 11 of the Evidence Act, 1975 (NRCD 323)]. The burden of persuasion is the obligation of a party to establish a requisite degree of belief concerning a fact in the mind of the tribunal of fact or the court [section 10(1) of NRCD 323]. It requires a party in a criminal trial to raise a reasonable doubt concerning the existence or non-existence of a fact or to establish the existence or non-existence of a fact by proof beyond a reasonable doubt [sections 10(2) of NRCD 323]. The burden of persuasion in a civil or criminal action “…as to the commission by a party of a crime which is directly in issue requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt” [section 13(1) of NRCD 323]. “In a criminal action, the burden of producing evidence, when it is on the accused as to any fact the converse of which is essential to guilt, requires the accused to produce sufficient evidence so that on all the evidence, a reasonable mind could have a reasonable doubt as to guilt” [section 11(3) of NRCD 323]. In Ali Yusuf Issa (No. 2) v. The Republic [2003 – 2004] SCGLR 174, the Supreme Court held that the burden of producing evidence and the burden of persuasion are the components of “the burden of proof”. When the accused person opened his case, he stated he would call some witnesses. After several adjournments, he was unable to produce his witnesses and his case was closed on 10th June 2022. On 30th June 2022, Richard Kojo Abban Esq. appeared for the accused and prayed the court to re-open the case of the defence to enable the accused re-testify and call his witnesses. The court granted counsel’s prayer to the extent that the accused was 10 permitted to call his witnesses – Michael Asamoah, an electrical engineer, and Madam Grace Asamoah Ewusie, a caterer. The accused person testified that he was living with PW1 while they were in a relationship. During the relationship, he found out that she was with another man, so, he moved away from her. This testimony was corroborated by DW1 who testified that the accused used to buy PW1 food and other items when they were lovers but stopped doing so, after he realized she had a secret boyfriend. According to the accused person, one day, PW1 brought the police to arrest him because she told them that he had defiled the victim. At the police station, when the accused person was asked what he did to the child, he said he had done nothing to her. The policeman told the accused person that if he admitted to defiling the child, he would “help” him. He was put in police cells; told he had been given bail and was brought to court. Michael Asamoah (DW1), an electrical engineer, also testified that the accused person told him the police said he should admit to the charge so they would let him go. Since the accused had never “seen” the police or had an issue with them, he believed what they said and admitted the offence. The accused person testified in cross-examination that on the material date, he was painting her room when PW1 left the child with him to go and buy food. This was not the first time PW1 had left the child with him. PW1 had left the TV on and there was a dance program showing to which the child was dancing along. He denied using his penis to brush the child’s vagina and said that if he had done that, the child would have told her mother as soon as she got back. He denied putting fear in the child to keep her silent and said that because of the relationship he had with the child, she would have told her mother immediately she returned if he had done something to her. The accused person pleaded that he had been falsely accused. He said PW1 made the accusation to the police out of anger when he stopped being in a relationship with her – he testified that in fact, it was PW1 who told him she wanted to have an affair with him. She 11 used to go to and from his house. He testified that he only gave the information about his relationship with PW1 and the fact that the police asked him to plead guilty so they could “assist” him; during his defence and not during the prosecutions’ case; because that was when the court told him he could tell his side of the story. In fact, he put it to PW1 while cross-examining her that she filed the complaint against him because he refused to sleep with her or give her money. DW1 testified that he lived in the same house as PW1 and the accused person, until the accused person moved into the house opposite them after the case was filed. He has known the accused person for 10 years. One day, when DW1 closed from work and was on his way back home, he heard about the arrest of the accused person for allegedly defiling the 7-year-old girl. He spoke to both PW1 and the accused person. PW1 told him that the accused defiled her daughter and said, one day, when she was fetching water, the accused’s son was driving carelessly on the road and a lady said, “If you don’t know and you use your car to hit me, I will deal with you unlike when you were left to go scot-free when you raped someone’s daughter”. PW1 told DW1 that she quickly went home to ask her daughter if she had been raped by the accused’s son. When PW2 denied it, she instructed her daughter to insist that she had been raped by the accused’s son. The accused on the other hand, said he had never done anything with PW1’s daughter. When it was put to DW1 that his testimony was based on hearsay, he said “Please, I know the accused person very well. That is why I am here. He can never do that thing.” This testimony was corroborated by Madam Grace Ewusie (DW1), a caterer and neighbour to the parties who testified that in February 2021 when she returned from work, her family told her that the accused person had been arrest by the police. According to DW1, from his interactions with PW1, she coerced her daughter and subjected her to beatings so she would lie that she had been defiled by the accused’s son. This was corroborated by DW2 who testified that PW1 told her that she asked her daughter who defiled her, and her daughter said it was not the accused’s son but the 12 accused himself, however, her daughter did not admit she had been defiled by the accused person until PW1 beat her up a few times. DW1 testified that the accused assisted him to search for accommodation in 2011 and it is through his help that he settled in his current abode. The accused has acted as an agent for other tenants in the house and led PW1 to obtain her tenancy there in 2020. The accused also assisted the complainant to fix her kitchen and paint her rooms. DW1 testified that the accused is a man of good character and integrity and is loved by many in the neighbourhood because of this Christlike behaviour. DW2 testified that her children told her the accused person had been arrested. When she enquired about the incident, PW1 told her that while the accused was painting her room, she left her child with him and returned between 4:30 – 5:30pm. PW1 did not tell her the time she left the child with the accused person in the room. PW1 then left to fetch water from where it was being sold. While she was there, the accused’s son drove by carelessly and a woman said to him, “As for me, if you hit me with the car, I will have you arrested. The way you misbehaved and did a foolish thing with that woman’s daughter, and she ignored you, as for me, if you are not careful, I will arrest you”. DW2 testified further that PW1 told her that because of the defilement, her daughter could not urinate and attend school on the day she was allegedly defiled. When DW2 saw the alleged victim sitting on the porch of the house while her mother was outside, she asked her twice whether she had urinated that day, she responded, “No, I can wee-wee”. When DW2 asked her the number of times she urinated, she answered that she had done so twice. She also said her mother had beat her up and told her that if anyone asks her whether she had urinated she should say she could not urinate. The following day, when DW2 approached PW1, she suggested to PW1 that from her interaction with PW2 the accused did not do anything to her. PW1 told her during their conversation that her daughter could not tell DW2 the truth because she was shy. PW1 also told DW2 that she took her daughter to the accused’s landlady to report the alleged defilement, but her daughter did not confirm the allegation to the land lady. The landlady 13 said that when PW1 brought Mika (PW2) to her, she could not speak so PW1 started beating Mika. The landlady asked PW1 to stop beating her and told her that if she would not stop beating the child, she should go out with the child. When DW2 and the landlady went to PW1 several times to question her further, she never opened the door to them. When DW2 went back to PW1 to ask her why she wants to put the accused in trouble. PW1 told her she was trumping up the allegation against the accused because the accused person helps his landlady and does not help her as he did when she first moved into the house. DW2 testified that she later discovered that PW1 and the landlady are sisters-in- law who have issues. According to DW2, PW1 visited her hatred for the landlady on the accused because he helps the landlady. DW2 finally testified that she has known the accused person for more than eleven years and lived with him in the same neighborhood. She has never heard about his engaging in an act of criminality. PW1 moved into the house about two years ago and had her room painted by the accused who used to give her money and help her when she needed it. The testimony of the prosecution and defence witnesses amounts to oath against oath evidence. In Lutterodt v. COP [1963] 2 GLR 429-440 the Supreme Court held that, Where, as in this case, the decision turns upon the oath of one prosecution witness against that of a witness for the defence, it is incumbent upon the trial court to examine the evidence of each of those two witnesses carefully along with other evidence in the case, oral, documentary and circumstantial as well, before preferring one of the conflicting evidence to the other; and where his preference is for the prosecution he must make it appear from his judgment that his said preference is reasonable, for the principle of law is, that if the court could not find reasonable grounds for preferring the evidence of the prosecution witnesses to contradictory evidence given by a defence witness, the prosecution has failed, because there would, at least, be reasonable doubt as to which of the two conflicting versions of the story is true, and the benefit of that doubt must be given to the defence. 14 In Lutterodt v. COP (supra), the Supreme Court further held, Where the determination of a case depends upon facts and the court forms the opinion that a prima facie case has been made, the court should proceed to examine the case for the defence in three stages: (1) Firstly, it should consider whether the explanation of the defence is acceptable, if it is, that provides complete answer, and the court should acquit the defendant; (2) If the court should find itself unable to accept, or if it should consider the explanation to be not true, it should then proceed to consider whether the explanation is nevertheless reasonably probable, if it should find it to be, the court should acquit the defendant; and (3) Finally, quite apart from the defendant's explanation or the defence taken by itself, the court should consider the defence such as it is together with the whole case, i.e., prosecution and defence together, and be satisfied of the guilt of the defendant beyond reasonable doubt before it should convict, if not, it should acquit. The court finds that the testimony of PW1 and PW2 are contradictory on three points. PW1 testified while recounting PW2’s alleged account of the incident, that it was the accused who bought PW2 rice. However, in her statements to the police and other witnesses, she stated that she left PW2 with the accused person to go and buy rice for PW2. PW3 testified that the accused forced PW2 to lie on the floor before assaulting her. However, in cross-examination, PW2 said the accused asked her to come and sit on him before he rubbed his penis on her vagina. Although PW1 and PW2 alleged the accused sat on a chair when he brushed his penis against the victim’s vagina, the police insisted the accused lay over the victim on the floor and forced the accused and victim to enact a scenario which they captured in a video. 15 PW1 also testified that the accused slept with/had sex with/defiled her daughter and this was confirmed by the doctor – this was supported by the facts attached to the charge sheet. However, PW1 testified in cross-examination that the victim said the accused brushed his penis against her vagina. PW2 categorically testified that the accused person did not sleep with her but brushed his penis against her vagina. The court finds from the inconsistencies in the evidence of the prosecution that the prosecution witnesses were not credible [section 80 of NRCD 323]. The prosecution’s case is also affected by the testimony of the defence that the accused person was coerced by the police to admit to the charge. The explanation of the defence witnesses of the accused’s side of the story is acceptable to the court and DW1 and DW2 were credible witnesses. The court finds from the evidence and the law that the accused person has raised a reasonable doubt that he defiled or indecently assaulted the then seven-year-old victim. The accused person is therefore acquitted and discharged of the offences of defilement and indecent assault of the then seven-year-old victim, contrary to sections 101(2) and 103(1) of the Criminal and Other Offences Act, 1960 (Act 29). Prosecutor: Chief Inspector Juliana Awuku Accused Counsel: Richard Kojo Abban Esq. (SGD) DORA G. A. INKUMSAH ESHUN CIRCUIT JUDGE 16