An Accra Circuit Court has acquitted and discharged a former legislator Eric Amoateng, who after serving a ten-year jail term in the United States for a drug-related offense, was also put before court in Ghana, for allegedly possessing a fake Ghanaian passport.
According to the judgment delivered by Justice Ellen Amoah the case by the state failed to prove beyond reasonable doubt, that the accused did anything untoward in acquiring the fake passport.
She furthered added that, the former legislator per the evidence provided by all prosecution witnesses, did not have any idea of the genuineness or otherwise of the passport he was carrying.
Background
The former Nkoranza North NPP MP, Eric Amoateng, was on December 11, 2005, arrested in the United States for possessing heroin valued at $6 million. Amoateng was tried, convicted and subsequently sentenced to a 10-year prison term and was released on July 30, 2014.
About 2.20 p.m. on August 7, 2014, Amoateng arrived at the Kotoka International Airport and during his arrival formalities, he was found to be in possession of a Ghanaian passport with the number H02347080.
The passport, the prosecution said, was in the name of one Barbara Inkum, and was issued on February 23, 2009 at a time when Amoateng was in prison in the USA.
According to the prosecution, analysis of the passport by the Document Fraud Office of the Ghana Immigration Service (GIS) showed that the passport was a forged one, as its bio data page had been substituted.
