Lawyer and politician Inusah Fuseini has stated that the state cannot initiate a criminal trial against businessman Alfred Agbesi Woyome again based on the same facts and evidence adduced in the initial trial.
The state lost the criminal aspect of the judgment debt case it brought against Woyome but won the civil trial. The Supreme Court in 2017 ordered Woyome to pay back the GH¢51 million that was illegally paid to him by the state.
However, the General Legal Council (GLC), in a notice dated January 31, 2024, revoked the license of the Chief State Attorney, Samuel Nerquaye-Tetteh, for receiving GH¢400,000 from the accused, Abgesi Woyome.
Responding to whether the chief state attorney who led the prosecution of the case was compromised, the former Tamale Central lawmaker said, “Your guess is as good as mine.”
He stressed that Nerquaye-Tetteh, while he was handling the case, considered filing for a nolle prosequi at some point. This was because the state prosecutor believed the state had no case in the matter against Alfred Woyome.
But he maintained that the action by the state attorney was unethical. He refused to state if the lead prosecutor was compromised.
“Our rules as lawyers require that we uphold high professional standards. We have a high moral standing in society. We exhibit the highest ethical standards,” he said, adding that “clearly it is unethical for a state prosecutor to be hobnobbing with an accused person,” he told Alfred Ocansey.
Background
The GLC, in a notice dated January 31, 2024, and signed by the Judicial Secretary, Justice Cynthia Pamela Koranteng, revoked the license of Mr. Nerquaye-Tetteh as a lawyer.
This means that Mr. Nerquaye-Tetteh can never practice as a lawyer again in Ghana after the Disciplinary Committee of the GLC, the regulatory body of the legal profession, found him guilty of professional misconduct under Rule 2(2) of the Legal Profession (Professional Conduct and Etiquette) Rules, 1969 (L.I. 613).
The GLC stated that Mr. Nerquaye-Tetteh personally oversaw the direct transfer of GH¢400,000 from Mr. Woyome to his wife’s bank account while representing the state in a lawsuit filed by Woyome in 2011.
According to the GLC, Mr. Nerquaye-Tetteh was unable to provide a plausible rationale for the GH¢400,000 that Mr. Woyome had sent into his wife’s bank account.
