Tarkwa (W/R), May 12, GNA - A Tarkwa Circuit Court has sentenced Kwaku Antwi, an ex-convict, to six years imprisonment in hard labour for posing as a prison officer and defrauding a petty trader and her family. He changed his plea of not guilty to guilty and pleaded with the court to forgive him.

Chief Inspector Alex Asamoah told the court presided over by Mr. John Ajet Nasam that Madam Adjoa Anuah was a petty trader at Akoon, a suburb of Tarkwa while the accused was an ex-convict who was discharged from the Tarkwa Prisons on March 14, 2007. He said that the accused met the brother of Adjoa called Kofi Kwarteng in prison but the latter was transferred to the Sekondi Prisons.

The Prosecutor said on April 30 this year, the accused went to the house of Adjoa and in the presence of some witnesses and introduced himself as a prison officer fro the Sekondi Prison who had been sent by Kwarteng.

He said the accused claimed that a Non Governmental Organisation (NGO) had gone to the Sekondi Prison to seek amnesty for prisoners who had served a year and above and succeeded in convincing Adjoa and her family that he could use money to bribe the authorities compiling names to add Kwateng's to those to be given the reprieve. Chief Inspector Asamoah said Adjoa and her family managed to raise nine hundred thousand cedis for the release of their relative. He said the accused left Tarkwa with the promise that Kwateng would be released in three days.

Adjoa's father followed up to the prison only to be told that they had been defrauded and a report was made to the Police who arrested the accused and charged him before the court. 12 May 07