The High Court in Accra has accepted into evidence the audio recording between the third accused in the ongoing ambulance case Richard Jakpa and Attorney General Godfred Yeboah Dame for the cross-examination of Mr Jakpa.
This is after the Office of the Attorney General rejected the relevance of the audio to the main trial.
The judge, however, after reviewing the arguments for and against its admission ruled that the audio should be admitted.
Lawyers for Ato Forson have since begun cross-examining Richard Jakpa on the audio.
Background
The National Democratic Congress (NDC) at a press conference on Tuesday, May 28, claimed that the audio recording reveals that the AG tried to coerce the third accused to implicate former Deputy Finance Minister, Dr Cassiel Ato Forson.
The audio conversation was tendered as part of exhibits by Ato Forson in support of an application for mistrial he filed at the court.
Justice Afia Serwah Asare Botwe, the presiding judge in dismissing the application for mistrial, assessed the content of the recording, after dismissing the Attorney General’s objection to the tendering of the pen drive containing the audio.
The Judge noted that the conversation reveals an engagement between Richard Jakpa and Godfred Dame.
However, the conversation does not support claims that the Attorney General asked Richard Jakpa to implicate Ato Forson.
She also found that the Attorney General did not make a statement that he needed the help of Richard Jakpa to implicate Ato Forson. She noted that those claims were rather made by Richard Jakpa.
According to Justice Afia Serwah Asare Botwe, those are rather the words of Richard Jakpa.
citinews.
