REGINA
V.
OJOJO

(1959) JELR 69016 (CA)

Court of Appeal 1 May 1959 Ghana
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- Conviction quashed due to substantial misdirection and non-direction by the trial judge, who failed to leave to the jury the issues of provocation and self-defence raised by the evidence. - Key principle: A judge must put all viable defen

Case Details

Judges:VAN LARE J.A. AS C.J,ACOLATSE J. ,OLLENNU J.
Other Citations:[1959] GLR 207 - 213, [1959] GLR 207

VAN LARE AG. C.J.

The appellant was convicted on the 11th December, 1958 before Bossman J., sitting with a jury at the Assizes holden at Cape Coast, upon a charge of murder. He has appealed to this Court against his conviction.

(His lordship stated the facts, and proceeded:-)

The notes of the Judge’s summing-up attracted our attention, and we granted leave to appeal. When the appeal came on for hearing we asked learned Crown Counsel for the respondent whether he could be of any assistance to the Court even before hearing counsel for the appellant. He readily agreed, and conceded (properly, in our view) that the Judge’s summing-up fell so far short of what the law required that he could not support the conviction. We are of the opinion that although the learned Judge took meticulous care in his summing-up in explaining the law of murder to the jury, and also in recapitulating the evidence for the prosecution, he unfortunately misdirected himself, both by actual misdirection and by non-dir…

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