cocaine trial

cocaine trial
Defence Closes Case In Cocaine Trial
Story:Stephen Sah

The defence in the 588.33 kilogramme cocaine trial yesterday closed the case with the evidence of Sven Leonard Herb, a 45-year-old German. Consequently, the court, presided over by Mr Justice F. Kusi-Appiah, a Court of Appeal Judge, sitting with additional responsibility as a High Court Judge, adjourned the case to September 14, to fix a date for judgement. Mr Justice Kusi-Appiah asked the Chief State Attorney, Mr Anthony Gyambiby, to file his written address by August 30, 2004 to enable the defence counsel to file their response by September 7.Herb and David Logan, a Briton, Kevin D. Gorman, an American, Mohammed Ibrahim Kamil, a Ghanaian , Frank David Laverick and Alan Hodgson, both Britons have been accused of shipping narcotic drugs into the country without lawful authority.The six are currently on remand at the Nsawam Medium Security Prisons, but have all pleaded not guilty to the various charges levelled against them.A seventh accomplice, Craig Alexander Pinnick, also a Briton, who was on the run was later arrested and remanded in custody by an Accra circuit court.Led in evidence by Mr Kwabla Senanu, his counsel, Herb told the court that he came to Ghana on December 12, 2003, to visit his family because the following day was his daughter’s birthday, while his wife was expecting another baby in January, 2004. He denied that the Narcotics Control Board and its sister agencies in the United Kingdom identified him as one of the international drug traffickers operating in Ghana.According to him, he was arrested when he paid Gorman a visit in his house to inform him about the birth of his son but a search on him did not reveal anything.He said a further search conducted in his house did not reveal anything either and he never conspired with anybody to deal in narcotic substances.Testifying under cross-examination by the Chief State Attorney, the accused admitted writing his caution statement to the police and also picked Logan and Laverick from the airport on January 2 and 6, 2004, respectively.Asked to explain why he said in his evidence that he picked the two because Gorman was busy and in his caution statement that he picked them because he wanted to go to town with a girl friend, the accused said in his caution statement nobody asked him that question.He said Gorman telephoned him to ask him to pick them from the airport but when asked to mention his telephone number the accused said he could not do that.When his telephone number was suggested to him , the accused said the number sounded familiar but he was not sure saying “it is possible but I can’t remember. I kept the number for about one year before my arrest.”He said when he was asked to pick the two people, he knew that Laverick was coming to Ghana because he had told him to buy a DVD player for him but in the case of Logan, he did not know that he was coming.The accused denied going to the Prampram Beach on December 31, 2003,to offload boxes containing cocaine to be conveyed to the house of Gorman in Tema.