Asamankese, Feb. 19, GNA - Kofi Kwarteng, a farm labourer, has been sentenced to three years' imprisonment in hard labour by the Asamankese Circuit Court on Tuesday for stealing cocoa pods. He pleaded guilty.

Prosecuting, Detective Chief Inspector Eric Okyere said, Mr Joseph Okyere, the complainant, who has a cocoa farm at Dwenase, near Asamankese, and had over the past two years been experiencing thefts of cocoa pods on his farm, alerted farmers with whom he shared common boundaries to keep watch for the thieves.

He said early in the morning of February 2, this year, the complainant went to the farm to keep watch and after a brief period, he spotted Kwarteng on the farm with a sack plucking cocoa pods into it and after plucking a lot, he would split the pods and put the beans into the sack.

The complainant, who waited for Kwarteng to harvest a sizeable number of pods, raised alarm and with the help of others, the accused was arrested and sent to the police station with the seized sack with the cocoa beans.

The Presiding Judge, Mr S. S. Appiah in sentencing Kwarteng, described him as a criminal, who would reap where he did not sow.