Court jails teenager for manslaughter

Tamale, July 14, GNA - A Tamale High Court on Wednesday sentenced Yakubu Tindana, 19, from Pishegu in the Karaga District, to 15 years imprisonment in hard labour for manslaughter. A seven-member jury found Tindana not guilty of conspiracy to murder and murder but guilty of manslaughter.

An accomplice, Yakubu Soalie, who is a brother of Tindana, was found not guilty on the two counts of conspiracy to murder and murder. The two were charged with conspiracy to murder and murder of Yakubu Fuseini.

Prosecuting, Mr Agbeko Kra, an Assistant State Attorney, told the court that on January 3, 2002, Soalie and one Fuseini Zakaria were engaged in a fight over a girl at Pishegu but were separated by the deceased, Fuseini and one Alpha Bawa.

Later in the evening the deceased, Soalie and Tindana met at a football match in the village.

Soalie and Tindana went to him and Soalie asked Fuseini why he had prevented him from fighting Zakaria. Soalie asked the deceased whether he knew what he had wanted to do to Zakaria and said "What I had wanted to do to Zakaria I will mete it out to you."

He removed his belt and hit the deceased's head while Tindana, who had hidden an axe on him, pulled it out and hit Fuseini's until he fell down. Some of the spectators took Fuseini to the Tamale Regional Hospital where he died. The two brothers escaped to Kumasi but the Kumasi Police arrested them upon a tip-off.