Bench warrant for judge's arrest

Wednesday, July 15, 2009 (Page 3)

THE Accra Circuit Court yesterday issued a bench warrant for the arrest of a magistrate, Anna Jane Ghartey, who is standing trial for allegedly defrauding a professor to the tune of GH¢18,000.
Anna Ghartey, who was until recently a magistrate at the Juvenile Court in Accra, is currently on interdiction.
She was alleged to have conspired with Samuel Aidoo, a building contractor, to deceive one Professor Joseph Adjaye into believing that she had parcels of land for sale at Adjiringanor, a suburb of Accra, succeeded in collecting a total of GH¢18,000 from him and prepared fake indentures covering two plots of land belonging to a deceased person.
In the course of police investigations, it turned out that the person whose name was on the indenture purported to be covering the plots of land sold to Prof Adjaye died on June 24, 2005 at the age of 98.
Anna Ghartey, however, failed to appear before the court to answer charges of four counts of conspiracy and defrauding by false pretences.
Her alleged accomplice, Samuel, was in court.
The matter was adjourned to Monday, July 20, 2009.
According to the facts of the case, as presented by Assistant Superintendent of Police Ms Mary Agbozo, in December 2006 Anna and Samuel collected GH¢11,000 from Prof Adjaye and a further GH¢7,000 from him in August 2007.
According to the prosecution, the accused persons managed to hand over two parcels of land to Prof Adjaye, who is resident in the United States of America (USA).
They also prepared documents covering the land and handed them over to the complainant.
However, Prof Adjaye was prevented from developing the land by some persons who also claimed ownership over it.
According to the prosecution, Anna replaced the plots in contention and gave Prof Adjaye new plots, which later turned out to be registered in another person’s name.
On realising he had been duped, Prof Adjaye lodged a complaint with the police and while investigations were ongoing Anna promised to refund $30,000, being the expenses incurred by Prof Adjaye as a result of his dealings with her, by July 31, 2008.
The prosecution said the accused person, however, failed to pay the amount and rather gave the complainant a plot of land at Agbogba, a suburb of Accra, and claimed that that plot of land was her personal property which she had used to defray part of her debt.
However, police investigations indicated that the said land also belonged to another person.