Twenty-eight year old Ishmael Tetteh, who wept uncontrollably at an Accra Circuit Court when he was arraigned for posing as a police officer, has told the court he pretended to be a police officer because his girlfriend was flirting around and he wanted to put fear in her.
Mr. Tetteh was charged with two counts to wit: defrauding by false pretense and pretending to be a police officer. He pleaded guilty with no explanation on count one and pleaded guilty on count two with explanation.
Giving his explanation to the court presided over by Her Honour, Mrs Abena Adjin Doku, the accused told the court that he wanted to put fear in his girlfriend who was cheating on him.
He also told the court that it was his girlfriend who told the police that he was not a police officer and asked the court to have mercy on him since he was not going to do that again.
The court after listening to him, convicted him on his own plea to 30 penalty units on count one (GH¢ 360.00) and 40 penalty units on count two (GH¢ 480.00), in default he is to serve a seven month-jail term.
He is also to refund the GH¢ 100.00 that was paid into his MTN mobile money account.
Weeping
The accused whilst waiting for his case to be called started weeping uncontrollably in court forcing the court to delay proceedings for 25 minutes to allow him calm his nerves.
When he finally mounted the docket, he pleaded guilty to all two counts that were pressed against him to wit, kidnapping and impersonating a police officer.
Brief facts
Presenting the facts of the case to the court presided over by Her Honour, Abena Adjin Doku, detective Insp. Kofi Atimbire said on December 12, 2015, the complainant, the father of the missing girl who resides at Christian Village at Achimota made a report that his daughter was missing and a police extract was given to him to make a radio announcement.
According to him, a number was given out for people to reach out to with any information about the whereabouts of the child.
According to the prosecutor, the accused later called the number and said the child was in his possession and demanded GH¢300.00 before he could have her.
Telephone conversation
The accused later told the complainant in a telephone conversation that the child was brought to him by someone and that she was a spirit child and therefore said he was going to leave the child somewhere for the complainant to go for.
After their conversation was made known to the police, the complainant was made to pay an initial deposit of GH¢ 100.00 to the accused person’s number. The police, however, tracked his telephone number and he was arrested.
According to the police, he had rented two apartments one at Oreko and the other at Anoth both at Adeiso in the Eastern Region where he was arrested.
Upon his arrest, he told the police that he was a police officer, but when checks were done it turned out that he was just impersonating someone. In his cautioned statement, he denied kidnapping a child but accepted impersonating a police officer. He later pleaded guilty to both counts and was remanded in police custody.
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