By Aminata Phidelia Allie
Magistrate Komba Kamanda of Court No. 2 has committed to the High Court in Freetown the case of an alleged theft onboard a parked aircraft involving a certain Moses John Wilson.
He was not represented by a lawyer.
Wilson was charged to court following an incident at the Freetown International Airport at Lungi where an aircraft carrying investors was broken into whiles its owners were in Freetown.
The 26-year-old accused was under preliminary investigations for three counts of larceny, malicious damage and wilful interference with the safety operations of a private jet.
The prosecution relied on three witnesses all of whom, according to the magistrate, led sufficient evidence against the accused. The magistrate had once referred to the accused as “an international embarrassment to the country”.
He said the likes of the accused were responsible for the bad image that the country currently had on the international stage, adding “I am going to deal with you”.
In his ruling, he observed that the first prosecution witness, who happened to be a security supervisor at the airport, had identified the accused as the person she saw inside the aircraft on the day of the incident.
He said he was convinced by the evidence led so far that the accused had a case to answer to in the High Court for which he should be committed and “I so order”.
He also ordered that the accused be remanded in prison until his case came up in the upper court.
In the same court a case of sexual penetration and abuse, involving a 42-year-old man, was on Saturday 31 August committed to the High Court for trial.
The accused, according to the prosecution, on several occasions in February this year had sex with the 17-year-old victim, leaving her pregnant. Although he was not charged with harbouring, the accused, who claimed he proposed love to the victim and had her consent, kept the girl in his room until she took in.
In his ruling, Magistrate Kamanda pointed out that the two witnesses, led by the prosecution, gave sufficient evidence to corroborate “a confessional statement to the police” by the accused.
He noted that “the victim’s consent was irrelevant considering her age. She is below 18. The evidence is not only sufficient but also overwhelming for the accused to be committed to the High Court”.
Politico 03/08/13
