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Supreme Court compensates teacher with GHc45K for wrongfully jailing him 15 years
Eric Asante was jailed for 15 years following allegation that he defiled and impregnated one of his pupils.
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The ruling, which was made in 2005 by the Tamale High Court, came after the teacher was accused by a 13-year-old girl who was his student.
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Although Mr. Asante constantly denied the allegations, the teenage girl held that she was his lover and that they had had sex many times.
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The convicted teacher decided to petition the Court of Appeal in 2006, but the case was dismissed for lack of enough evidence to prove his innocence.
In 2012, the teacher again appealed to the Supreme Court to have his case reopened. A DNA test was conducted on the complainant to uncover whether Mr. Asante fathered her baby, as she had claimed.
Subsequently, the five-member Supreme Court panel presided over by Justice Anin Yeboah on the 26th of January 2017 acquitted and the discharged Mr. Asante who had already served a 15-year jail term.
The 40-year-old decided to file for GHȻ7.3m for loss of income, psychological trauma, mental disorder among other things.
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On Wednesday, the Supreme Court, presided over by Justice Anin Yeboah, ordered the state to compensate him with a sum of GHc45,000, adding that his salary for the period he was in prison should be paid to him in full.
Meanwhile, counsel for the acquitted teacher, Victor Kwesi Opeku, was disappointed with the sum handed out to his client as compensation.
According to him, the amount is “paltry”, considering the fact that the state has destroyed the life of his client.
“I am very disappointed that the court threw out all the claims we made and awarded a paltry sum of GHȻ 45,000. For a state to completely destroy a young person’s life for 13 years and get away with GHȻ 45,000 is not deterrent enough,” the lawyer said.
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