Mrs Grace Coleman, a former Deputy Minster of Finance and Economic planning, has been indicated to appear before a United States District Court in Greenbelt on Tuesday 20 May 2003, on charges of conspiracy to engage in illegal slavery.
Also to appear with her is her daughter, Barbara Coleman Blackwell and son-in-law Kenneth Blackwell. According to investigation conducted by the “Evening News”, Mrs Coleman received the summons last week to appear before the court in the case in which seven witnesses are expected to be called by the prosecution.
Our investigations further revealed that Barbara Coleman Blackwell has been suspended by her employers as a result of the case. The supposed victim of the slavery, Margeret Owusuaah, a first cousin of Mrs Coleman, according to our investigations, is also demanding $150,000 as compensation.
When contacted, Mrs Coleman confirmed the story but said the US court, instead of writing to her, wrote to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, demanding her extradition. She said extradition has procedures, which must be followed without any circumvention.
The former Deputy Minister said she could only be extradited to the US if the state charged and tried her in Ghana first. That, she said, had not been done but the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is trying to persuade her to go to the US and face trial. She said the US court initially impressed upon Barbara Coleman to plead guilty or else more charges would be preferred against her.
Mrs Coleman said it was when Barbara refused to budge to the demands of the court that she (Grace Coleman) was added as having conspired with her daughter and son-in-law. Grace Coleman and her daughter can be jailed 20 years each if convicted, and fined $250,000. Kenneth Blackwell also faces a maximum of 10 years in prison and a fine of $250,000, if convicted of all the courts.
The three people were in October last year indicted for allegedly sending a Ghanaian woman to the US illegally and enslaving her, using her as an unpaid domestic servant for over 17 months. The Washington Post newspaper post published in the US that a Federal Grand jury on immigration and conspiracy charges indicted Kenneth and Barbara.
The indictment charge further stated that Mrs Coleman used forced labour, confiscated Owusuaah’s passport and visa and made false statements to the US officials. It continued that in February 2000, Mrs Coleman, working with her daughter Barbara, fraudulently obtained a US visa for Owusuaah by knowingly submitting a visa application with false information.
In February 2000, when Owusuaah arrived in the US, the indictment said Mrs Coleman took her passport ad Barbara hid it and the visa to prevent her from leaving her Takoma Park home. The two women, according to the indictment, used intimidation to make Owusuaah provide domestic labour and childcare for little or no pay and threatened her with deportation.
