21 October 2008
Freetown, Sierra Leone
A Jury at the High Court in Makeni has on the 10th October 2008 found in favour of a Timap for Justice client accused of killing her own baby. Timap’s client, a thirty year-old woman from the north of Sierra Leone, was found not guilty and now walks as a free woman after three years of incarceration.
Timap’s directors Simeon M. K. Koroma Esq. and Nancy Sesay (Ms.) served as defence counsel throughout the trial. Timap got to know about this case when S. M. K. Koroma Esq., in attendance at a court session for another case at a Magistrate Court, was intimated about it by the then sitting magistrate. Investigations were conducted on the case by Timap’s paralegals and Timap took up the case in support of the accused and provided her with free legal services.
The murder, which was orchestrated in an extremely gruesome and inhumane manner (eyes plucked off, limb hacked and face peeled off), occurred sometime in mid December 2005. In her statement made to a Timap paralegal, the accused woman explained that she had just finished dressing up her baby and left her sleeping in the room while she raced down to the stream to fetch some water as part of her daily routine. Upon her return, she said she spotted her father carrying the child in his arms. According to the woman, when he (the father) saw her approaching, he started shouting, accusing her of mutilating and murdering the child. Dumbfounded out of shock, she was arrested by some neighbours and subsequently handed over to the police after having received a thorough beating from an angry mob.
Murder is a very grave crime that attracts the death penalty especially in Sierra Leone. Timap commenced representing the accused woman in 2006. The case was adjourned dozens of times in both the Magistrate and High Court but it ultimately reached its climax in the Makeni High Court, when the prosecution could not prove its case, lacking sufficient evidence to tender. This left the Jury with no choice but to pass a verdict of not guilty
Philip S. K. Sesay
Media Officer
Timap for Justice
+232-[ 0 ]76-627-210