Division: IN THE COURT OF APPEAL
Date: 28TH SEPTEMBER, 1959.
Before: VAN LARE J.A. AS C.J., GRUNVILLE SHARP J.A. AND OLLENNU J.
Gyelego Grumah was behaving so abnormally in his town that he came to be regarded as an insane person, and was in consequence taken by his landlord to a native medicine man for treatment. This consisted of a supposed medical bath, and the placing round his wrist of a “juju” talisman. Next morning he was suddenly seen in the yard slashing with a cutlass three very young children who were playing there. One of them, five years old, died of this assault, and Grumah was charged with murder.
In his statement to the police when he was arrested immediately after the incident, Grumah said that he considered his landlord had caused the talisman to be placed on his wrist with a view to killing him later, and so he (Grumah) wounded the children.
At Grumah’s trial at Tamale on the 30th January, 1959, before Scott J. on an indictment of murder, one of the three Assessors was of opinion that Grumah was guilty but insane. In convicting him, however, the learned Judge stated:
“I am satisfied that the accused, when he committed the act, was not prevented by reason of mental derangement or disease from knowing the nature of his act, as from the evidence of P.W.3 the accused was calm on the morning of the incident, and in his own statement shortly after to the Police the accused clearly stated the reason for his act. I find the accused guilty of Murder and I convict him accordingly.”
Grumah appealed to the Court of Appeal (Criminal Appeal No. 19/1959).
[p.308] of [1959] GLR 307
Andoh for appellant (Grumah) The learned judge failed to direct the assessors and himself adequately on the question of insanity. Upon the evidence it cannot be argued that the learned Judge was satisfied as to the mental state of the prisoner. The reason given was not satisfactory. Glasgow for respondent (Crown). The evidence is not such as to justify the finding that the prisoner was not mentally deranged.
JUDGMENT OF VAN LARE J.A.
(His lordship stated the facts, and proceeded:-)
The only point for decision in this appeal is whether the verdict should have been one of guilty but insane.
The appellant was described as really fond of the children, against whom it was impossible to imagine that he might have malice. The landlord, father of the deceased child, testified to the appellant’s general good character, and also to what he (the landlord) believed to be the state of the appellant’s mind when he committed the act in respect of which he was charged. In his opinion, based upon the appellant’s behaviour during the four days preceding the commission of the offence, the appellant was insane. He testified that the appellant
(1) without any reason whatsoever decided to stop work and to return to his home-town;
(2) refused money to pay his fare home;
(3) unceremoniously disappeared from the house to the surprise of the inmates;
(4) did not in fact return to his home-town, but sojourned in the forest, and returned to the house after some days with scratches all over his body and in torn clothes;
(5) refused to accept better clothes offered him.
These points do not appear to have been given any consideration in the summing-up or in the judgment of the learned trial-Judge, who rejected the defence of insanity because the appellant was said to be “calm on the morning of the incident.”
We are of opinion that the reason given for the rejection of the plea of insanity is not well founded, and that the learned trial-Judge failed to take a proper view of the facts. It is commonplace that a mentally deranged or an insane person can be “calm.” The learned Judge appears to have misdirected himself by non-direction on the question of “temporary insanity” or a lucid interval, and we think
[p.309] of [1959] GLR 307
that had he directed the assessors (and himself) properly on the points we have discussed, the verdict would most probably have been one of guilty but insane.
It appears to this Court upon a critical examination of the evidence that, although the appellant is guilty of the act charged against him, he was insane at the time the act was done so as not to be responsible according to law for his actions. Acting, therefore, in accordance with section 11 (4) of the Court of Appeal Ordinance, we quash the sentence passed at the trial, and we order that the appellant be kept in custody as a criminal lunatic at the Mental Hospital, Accra, and that he do receive the necessary treatment, until the Governor-General’s pleasure be known.
