By Saio Marrah
Justice Adrian Fisher has dismissed all charges of larceny brought against Zainab Mansaray, a distributor of Dyna Lab Sierra Leone Limited, and ordered the complainant, Mohamed Saluku Koroma, to pay her a compensation of NLE 30,000(Thirty thousand New Leones) within a week.
The presiding judge further said in his judgement at the Freetown High Court No.1 on Wednesday 7th June 2023 that if the complainant fails to honour the compensation, he will be sent to jail.
The decision came after State Prosecutor, Solomon Christian Kekurah told the court that there will be no more witnesses and that all charges against the accused be dropped.
He said the evidence was contradictory, and that the accused be discharged.
In his response, the defence lawyer, Randy Salieu Bangura from Legal Aid Board, after expressing his appreciation over the decision, asked that his client be compensated.
He said this is because the woman had been socially and financially embarrassed, with the Legal Aid Board having to help her.
Bangura later informed journalists that the complainant, Koroma who happens to be a boyfriend of the accused and who has a two year- old daughter, was the one that reported the accused to the police about stolen items at Dyna Lab.
He said the complainant was the one that hired the services of the accused as a distributor, and was not an employee of Dyna Lab.
According to him, what the complainant did was instead of carrying his own cross, he shifted it to the accused. The defence lawyer said the case has caused the accused so much social embarrassment to the extent that the mother of the complainant came to the court and denied knowing of any relationship between her son and the woman.
Bangura said: “The prosecution was so honest, magnanimous and brave enough to attest to the fact that there is no case against Zainab Kamara”.
As a defence he expressed how proud he was, saying justice has been served by the judiciary and hoped that the trend will continue.
He said “the state is here to prosecute and not to persecute people. You cannot use her (Zainab) case as a sacrificial lamb.”
The woman covered her face with her hands and wept as the judge pronounced her freedom.
Meanwhile the complainant has been arraigned before Justice Binneh Kamara at the High Court for an alleged embezzlement of funds belonging to the same company.
Copyright (2023) Politico (12/06/23)
