A porter, Kwame Elijah, 31, was on Thursday sentenced to 10 years imprisonment in hard labour for unlawful possession of narcotics by a Takoradi Circuit Court.

He pleaded not guilty but the court found him guilty after the trial and was sentenced accordingly.

Giving the facts of the case, Inspector Seth Aheglebe told the court presided over by Mr. Charles Bamfo Nimako that on December 10, 2012, at about 00430 hours, the complainant Corporal Anthony Eshun, a soldier, from the Second Battalion of Infantry (2BN) spotted Elijah with a polythene bag at Chinese, a suburb of Takoradi.

He said Elijah was spotted walking towards the Okatakyie hotel area whilst littering the street with the sugar cane he was chewing.

The prosecution said the complainant asked the convict to pick up the sugar cane peels, and whilst doing so, a wrapped substance suspected to be Indian hemp fell from his polythene bag.

Elijah was apprehended with the help of the police from the Drug Law Enforcement Unit (DLEU) and a search conducted on him retrieved 71 wrappers of Indian hemp, which he claimed ownership.

Inspector Ahelegbe said the substance was sent to the Police Forensic Laboratory in Accra, and after the test proved positive for cannabis and weighed 128.498 grams.

The convict was then arraigned and prosecuted.