As the Legal Aid Board prepares to provide legal assistance
to indigents and children engaged in election related violence, it has
successfully secured the discharge of a twenty-five old from Wilberforce in the
West of Freetown charged with violence.
The Legal Aid Defence Counsel Hadiru Daboh secured the
discharge after drawing the court’s attention to the failure of the complainant
to attend court sittings for seven consecutive adjournments. What’s more, the
complainant has not furnished the court with any reasons for his absence. Magistrate
I.S. Bangura agreed with the Defence Counsel and discharged the matter. He
noted that discharge would not stop the prosecution from reinstating the matter
in future.
The accused, Alpha Kanu who plied his trade as driver and
apprentice at the Wilberforce lorry park got involved in a fight with his boss
Michael Aruna in February 2017. He was arrested and taken to the Congo Cross
Police station following a complaint by his boss. According to Alpha Kanu, his
injuries were ignored by the police even though they were more serious. He
spent fifteen days at the Congo police station before the matter was charged to
court.
The Executive Director of the Legal Aid Board, Ms. Fatmata
Claire Carlton-Hanciles described the discharge as a test case which has been
won. ‘We will be representing accused
charged with election related violence,’ she said. ‘This case has, in some way,
prepared us for the task ahead in terms of approach and legal arguments.’
According to Carlton-Hanciles there are lessons to be
learned. ‘The complainant is not interested in justice, he is only interested
in having the accused locked up which he succeeded in doing,’ she said. ‘We have too many such cases inour justice
system, we have to find a way of punishing those who undermine the justice
delivery system in this manner. I have a feeling we will have a lot of such
cases in the election period, wherein people take matters which could be
resolved in the community to the police to have their opponents lock up. We
will be very ruthless with people who use the justice system to witchhunt or
punish their opponents.’
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