A Tarkwa Circuit Court on Friday sentenced Yaw Mensah, 24, an armed robber, to 10 years imprisonment in hard labour.
The court, presided over by Mr. Lartey Young, found Mensah, also known as Mama, guilty of conspiracy, attempted robbery and causing harm.
Mr. Young said Mensah and his accomplice, now on the run, did not succeed when they attempted to rob Mr. John Kwadwo Tandoh, proprietor Tandoh Hotel at Tarkwa, of his BMW saloon car.
The intention, he said, made the accused liable.
Mensah, who claimed to be a taxi driver in Kumasi but was residing at Atonsu, near Kumasi, identified his accomplice as Yaw Agyemang, a dealer in wrist watches, operating between Kumasi and Abidjan.
Detective Inspector K.E. Boateng Kuntoh told the court that last May 30, Mensah and Agyemang checked in at Tandoh Hotel in the evening.
He said that in the evening, Mr. Tandoh called at the hotel for some few minutes.
When he got into the car again and was about to leave, Mensah and Agyemang pounced on him and demanded his car key.
In the ensuing struggle, Mensah pulled out a pistol and shot Mr. Tandoh in the left leg while Agyemang stabbed his jaw with a sharp object.
On hearing the gun shot, Miss Mary Eluekeh, the receptionist, rushed to the scene. She hit Mensah’s hand with a big stick and the pistol fell.
She raised the alarm and Mensah was overpowered but Agyemang escaped.
Mr. Tandoh was treated at the Tarkwa Government Hospital and discharged. Ghanaian Times
