A circuit court in Asokwa has sentenced a 35-year-old barber to 10 years in hard labour imprisonment after pleading guilty to two counts of the threat of death and robbery.
James Awuni pleaded guilty to the crime contrary to Sections 75 and 149(1) of the Criminal Offenses Act of 1960, Act 29.
Awuni, in an incident that occurred on August 6, 2023, used a Vodafone number (0500637074) to call the wife of the Chief Executive of Obuasi Bitters, alleging that he had been contracted by someone to kill her husband.
Alarmed by the threat, the woman informed her husband, who called the same number to confirm.
During the phone conversation, Awuni expressed reluctance to carry out the threat for undisclosed reasons and demanded an amount of GHS1,200 from the complainant. The worried husband complied with the demand and sent the money.
However, the complainant reported the matter to the Police Intelligence Directorate, which initiated an investigation. Acting on intelligence, Awuni was arrested on September 27, 2023, at his hideout in Bebu, near Kumasi, in the Ashanti region.
During court proceedings on October 6, 2023, Awuni admitted his guilt for both the threat of death and robbery charges and pledged to refund the money to the complainant.
On Friday, he refunded the full amount of GHS1,200 before receiving a 10-year jail term. The court imposed a 2-month sentence for the threat of death and a 10-year sentence for robbery, to be served concurrently.
In her ruling, Her Honour Vida Yeboah, the presiding judge, considered the accused’s refund of the money as a mitigating factor when imposing the minimum sentence for robbery.
SOURCE: DAILY MAIL GH
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