As 7th & 8th Prosecution Witnesses testify in M’bakui Fraud Case… New Defence Lawyers Take Over By Alhaji Samura As the fraud matter between first accused person Mohamed M’bakui and two other accused persons versus the complainant Mr. Malik Sarik an Indian business man continues at the Freetown Magistrate Court No.1 at Pademba Road, presided over by Tonia Barnett, the seventh and eighth Prosecution Witnesses testified before Magistrate Tonia Barnett yesterday in court. PW7 Mr. Jonnatan Moriba attached to the Department of Foreign Nationals at the Immigration office in Sierra Leone, testified that his office has the responsibility to issue visas to both citizens and foreign nationals and granting residential permits to non-citizens. During cross-examination by the lead prosecutor Superintendent of Police, Kamara, a photocopy and original of the complainant (Mr. Malik Sarik’s) passport was handed over to PW7 to verify the authenticity of the document. PW7 responded that he can identify the passport as belonging to the Indian Businessman. He went further to state that the document also carries various dates which showed Mr. Malik’s various arrivals and departures from Sierra Leone. The passport was then tendered in court as Exhibit G. Eighth Prosecution Witness, Detective Police Constable 1344 Andrew Ronko in his testimony, testified that, he recognized the first, second and third accused persons and could recall on 11th April, 2013, when he was on duty at the Transnational Organized Crime Unit at Muray Town, when the complainant Mr Malik made a statement to him that he had been defrauded by the first accused Mr. Mohamed M’bakui and two others money to the tune of seven hundred and five thousand United States dollars ($705,000). On the following day he went on, a team of police officers led by Detective Mohamed Sebeh went on the search and made an arrest of the three suspects. He added that statements were taken from them. Opening the tendered statements taken from the accused persons, the second and third accused persons objected on the ground that PW8 was not present at the time they were making their statement to the Police and that they had affixed their signatures to guarantee the authenticity of their statements. However, the testimonies were tendered as exhibits to the court. PW8 further stated that on diverse dates a search was carried out in the house of the 1st accused where documents of interest to Police were discovered. He maintained that Police officers departed together with the first and third accused for Kenema and made a thorough search at the house of the 1st accused where documents of Police interest were also discovered. However, it could be recalled that two defence lawyers for the first, second and third accused persons withdrew their interest in the case, whilst another defence lawyer Robin-Mason was unavoidably absent during the hearing yesterday. But a battery of young lawyers took up the defence for the accused persons yesterday. The new defence laywers included F. Karifala, S. S. Thomas, A. D. Bangura and I. Kanneh. An application for bail was renewed by the defence lawyers, but Magistrate Tonia Barnett turned down their application and the three accused persons were sent back to the Pademba Road maximum prison. The matter comes up again on Monday 8th, July, 2013.
Posted on: Mon, 08 Jul 2013 09:51:17 +0000
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