A 28-year-old driver, has been sentenced to two years imprisonment, in hard labour, by the Asamankese circuit court, for stealing two tipping motors, valued at GH�1,600, belonging to a fitter.
Richard Opoku Kwarteng, the convict, pleaded guilty.
Giving the facts of the case, Police Chief Inspector Ben Nyonator, told the court that, both, the complainant, a fitter and accused lived at Suhum and Kofigya respectively.
He said for sometime now, the complainant had been reporting to the police about the stealing of vehicle spare parts and also the siphoning of fuel from parked vehicles in his fitting shop.
On September 19 this year, at about 03:00 hours, a witness in the case was in his parked vehicle by the roadside, along the main Suhum-Kumasi trunk road, when he saw the accused coming from a nearby fitting shop owned by the complainant with a tipping motor, which he put into the boot of his taxi, parked nearby.
Chief Inspector Nyonator said the witness confronted the accused, but he (accused) warned the witness not to get closer to him or else he would butcher him.
The witness sensing danger, quickly went into his car, and switched on the head lights on the accused.
The accused sensing danger entered his taxi and sped off towards Kpankpan, a village near Suhum, and the witness gave him a chase and took down the number of the taxi the accused was driving.
The witness went back to the military base and informed the commander about the incident.
The military commander and one other officer then pursued the accused but they later saw the taxi abandoned by the roadside and on inspecting it found two tipping motors and fitting tools.
The military men left the taxi under the care of two hunters, who happened to be around, and told them the circumstances that led to the taxi being left there, and went back to Suhum to inform the complainant.
At about 06:00 hours, the same day, the complainant and others went to where the taxi had been abandoned with the intention of towing it to the police station in Suhum, when they had information that the accused had been arrested by the hunters and taken to the Odikro of the town.
The complainant and his team decided to go the Odikro house for the accused.
However on reaching Suhum, they were informed that the accused together with the tipper motors had been handed over to the police.
In his caution statement to the police, the accused stated that, he was hired by a certain young man, who put the two tipping motors into his taxi boot, and said he was going for his bag but never returned.