Court adjourns Bulldog's case to June 30; Police want more time

The Accra Central and LA Magistrate Court (5) has adjourned to June 30 the case involving Nana Asiama Hanson (Bulldog), who has been charged for allegedly murdering Fennec Okyere, a music producer. The court adjourned the case after Prosecutor, Chief Inspector Sancher, begged the court for more time to finish his investigations into the matter. Bulldog, who has been charged for allegedly murdering Fennec Okyere was granted bail by the Human Rights Court on Tuesday, May 27. 'The arrest' He was picked up by police on May 15 in Kokomlemle, a suburb of Accra, as a prime suspect in the murder of Fennec Okyere who was killed at his residence on March 13 by unknown assailants. The deceased was the manager of hiplife artiste, Kwaw Kesse. Bulldog made his first appearance at the Magistrate Court on Monday, May 19 and was remanded into police custody despite appeals by the defence counsel for the suspect to be granted bail. Not satisfied with the decision by the Magistrate Court to hold their client, lawyers for Bulldog took the matter to the Human Rights Court and requested for bail. The High Court upheld the request. 'Bail' The Human Rights Court granted the request by the defence counsel because the facts as presented by the police and upon which they were holding Bulldog were "speculative" and did not link him to the charges that had been preferred against him. On that basis, the court ruled that, Bulldog deserved his freedom and should not even have been held for a day. 'Second court appearance' During Monday's hearing, Chief Inspector Sancher, pleaded to the court, presided over by Her Worship Miss Mavis Quinoo to ask the accused to give them access to his mobile phone to enable them continue with their investigation. According to him, the mobile phone, which is in the possession of the prosecution is protected by a password and asked the court to order the suspect to make his phone password accessible to them. Garry Nemako, lawyer for Bulldog objected to the request stressing the mobile phone of the accused person is not the subject matter of the investigations and wondered the basis on which prosecutors were seeking access to the mobile phone of Bulldog. He was of the view the prosecutor must name the basis and the foundation upon which he was making the demand Her Worship Miss Mavis Quinoo agreed with the arguments of the defence counsel and urged prosecutors to provide justification for their request. 'Witch-hunting' Bulldog's lawyer Garry Nemako told Myjoyonline.com after the hearing that "we don't sometimes understand the manner in which they (prosecutors) are doing this work." He said the prosecutors "are doing what we call a fishing expedition. " According to him, the persecutor's request to have access to communications on his client's phone shows "total confusion. There is nothing to click on" and that "we have objected to that application and the court says they should bring reasonable grounds why they want to go into his private phone." He said the prosecutors are currently embarking on "speculative trial. We don't do trial like that. It [is] like witch-hunting." He wondered why the police are still holding on to his client's phone especially when "they have not said in their facts that there was any communication between this guy (Bulldog) and the deceased person (Fennec Okyere) on the facts before the courts...so what is the basis for keeping the guy's phone?" "They have rather said that there were third party communications from third party phones to this guy's phone. Third parties who are unknown...they have not been arrested so who are these third parties, we don't know them," Garry Nemako added.

Credit: Ernest Dela Aglanu /myjoyonline