Suspected Kantamanto Market arsonist secured GH ¢ 300,000 bond | criminality

A teacher accused of torching sections of the Kantamanto market on Tuesday appeared in Kaneshie District Court in Accra.

Accused of causing illegal damage, Daniel Komla Dah pleaded not guilty.

The tribunal chaired by Mrs. Rosemary Egyiri admitted him to a bond in the amount of GH ¢ 300,000 with two bonds to be justified. The sureties, the court said, should provide residential addresses in the jurisdiction.

The court further ordered the accused to report to the police on the first Monday of each month. Dah is due to reappear on January 4 of next year.

Previously, Dah’s attorney, Mr. Theophilus Donkor had asked the court to admit his client on bail.

According to Mr. Donkor, under section 19 (2) (c), the accused was presumed innocent until found guilty by a competent court.

Mr Donkor said his client was arrested on December 18 of this year but has been kept in custody up to date.

“The police committed an illegality keeping him in their custody and they also broke the mandatory 48-hour rule,” he said.

The defense lawyer said that Dah was a subject teacher at Tsito – Awudome in the Volta region but resided in Ho with his family.

The prosecution led by Detective Sgt.Richard Amoah opposed the bail, saying that when Dah got bail he would interfere with police investigations.

According to Detective Sergeant Amoah, the investigation into the case is only just beginning and the police were afraid when Dah was released on bail that he would interfere with the evidence on his Facebook account.

He said police were seeking to order the court to access his Facebook account details on the suspect.

“The deposit would not prevent him from accessing his Facebook account,” he added.

The facts of the prosecution are that the accused resides in Ho in the Volta region.
He said that on December 15 of this year there was a fire in Kantamnato in which many shops, merchandise and other properties that were in Ghana’s several million cedis were set on fire.

The prosecution said “the cause of the fire is suspected to be an act of arson.”

The prosecution said that on December 18 of this year, the suspect was arrested in Ho for investigation and it was revealed that Dah was a member of a Facebook group chat platform called NDC Administrator.

According to the prosecution, on December 14 of this year, the accused posted a message on their platform to say “we are burning Kantamanto tomorrow”.

According to the prosecution, the accused, in his warning, denied the offense.
Meanwhile, the prosecution said investigations were ongoing.