ITALIAN KILLERS GET 125 YEARS

By Felix  Engsalige  Nyaaba

Two of the three suspected armed robbers who attacked and murdered the Italian investor  her resident at Teshie, a suburb of Accra,  were yesterday convicted and sentenced 125 years in prison by an Accra Circuit Court.

They are to serve the sentence in Hard Labour.

The convicts, Fuseini Mumuni Gariba, alias Buger and Awudu Mumuni, alias Baba Ayittey, were sentence on their own plea of guilty with explanation to the offence of robbery contrary.

The court presided over by Mr. Francis Obiri, sentenced Fuseini to 40 years on the two count of robbery, while Awudu was sentenced to five and 40 years for conspiracy and robbery. The sentences runs concurrently.

The first accused, Fuseini Mumuni, is also being charged with one count of murder contrary to the criminal offence Act 29, and is expected to be transfer to the magistrate court for the committal proceedings.

The court, however, remanded Charles Agyemang, alias Nana Yaw, the third accused person in custody to reappear on July 24, after he had pleaded not guilty to the crime.

Before the sentence, the two convicts in attempt to have some mercy from the court engaged themselves in blame game as to who lure who into the robbery expedition that led the killing of  the Italian investor.

 Fuseini explained that he was in his house when Awudu came and asked him to accompany him to a place, but never told him they were going for robbery.

However, the court did not take their concocted explanation and accordingly convicted and sentenced them to imprisonment for the offence.

Before passing the sentence, the presiding judge said, the action by the convicts sought to create panic among well meaning investors, especially the victims who are in the country as expatriate to invest, stressing that the barbaric act would scare investors into the country.

According to Mr. Obiri , armed robbery is on the increase in the country and that the sentence would serve as deterrent to others who would defy  the laws to emulate such act.

The prosecution case was that the victims, including the deceased are Italian tourist and business persons and are also members of the Herbal Company of Italy.

They arrived in the country on April 16, this year to train and explore distributors for their products and were initially living at Ashaiman, near Tema and later moved to Teshie.

According to Deputy Superintendent of police(DSP) Reindolf Agyemag, on June 18, this year at about 12:00 mid night, the victims and a Ghanaian lady friend arrived at the entrance of their house from Osu on their VW Passat Saloon car with registration No.GT 6997-10 drive by Donnini Lorenzo.

The convicts and their accomplice who had trailed them from the Coffee Shop at Osu in a taxi cab suddenly attacked them at a gun point and also subjected them to beating and later made away with their bag containing their travelling documents, one laptop, four mobile phones and various sum of money.

The prosecutor noted that, the convicts and their accomplice also opened the car boot and took away some food items which the victims bought for uses.

According to him, as if the booty was not enough, Fuseini pulled a gun and shot at the deceased,Poala  Badallas, 49 who was sitting at the  passenger side in the head and injured  her in the process.

She was rushed to the Korle-bu Hospita, but she died the following day while on admission.

The prosecutor further   stated that, in a haste to escape, Fuseini nokiaC2 phone with double chip number 0266694756 and 02425118771 fell on the ground and was retrieved by the police at the scene of the crime, and used same number to trace Fuseini and had him arrested at his hideout at Weija, in Accra.