By Larry-Alans Dogbey & David Tamakloe
An audacious capture and dispatch of a suspected run-away Ghanaian murderer last week Thursday, to face trial in America, has revealed a selective application of the law by the Foreign Affairs Ministry and the Ghana Police in the extradition of fugitive criminal suspects abroad.
Long before the bundling and repatriation of the 39-year-old murder suspect, Richard Konadu, both Ghana’s Foreign Ministry and state security agencies have since 2007, been squatting on a similar order from the US government to handover the sitting Member of Parliament (MP) for Upper Denkyira East, Nana Amoakoh, to face criminal charges for stealing.
These requests are based on an extradition treaty signed between the United Kingdom and US on December 22, 1931 and extended to Ghana on June 24, 1935.
Prior to handing over Richard, The Herald having gotten wind of the collaboration between the Ghana Security authorities contacted the US Embassy to find out about the case of the MP but was told “The United States and Ghana routinely cooperate on law enforcement matters, but the Embassy does not comment on specific extradition requests”.
However, the embassy said “further inquiries regarding this matter should be directed to the appropriate Ghanaian authorities. Thanks, Ben East, Information Officer, U.S. Embassy, Accra”.
The New Patriotic Party (NPP) MP, is being sought after for stealing over $1 million belonging to his employers, Fone-A-Car, a New York-based limousine service company, which he worked for in the US before coming to Ghana to be elected as an MP, to pass laws.
Nana Amoakoh, also known as Augustine Asiedu, was expected to stand trial alongside a former colleague, Nick Zarbhanelian, over the theft case but fled to Ghana.
Mr. Zarbhanelian stood trial alone as the Ghanaian authorities failed to act, unlike the case of Richard for killing his wife, 27-year-old Regina Carroll, in Irvington New Jersey.
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) sources in the US told The Herald on phone from faraway Essex County that Richard Konadu was returned to the United States last week Thursday night to face murder charges in the shooting to death of Regina, a mother of two, in 2003.
Konadu fled to England and then to Ghana after the shooting, and an international investigation ensued.
The FBI office in Newark coordinated the overseas investigation with overseas agents and, U.S. diplomatic security services in Nigeria, Sierra Leone and the Ghana Police Service, authorities said.
FBI Special Agent-In-Charge of the case, Michael B. Ward has, meanwhile, been quoted as saying:
"As with any international fugitive case, a lot of sweat equity went into this investigation, beginning with the Irvington Police Department, and ending with the Ghana Police Service.’’
Mr. Konadu will face weapons and murder charges related to his alleged role in the shooting to death of his wife, said acting Essex County Prosecutor Carolyn A. Murray.
The demeanour of the Police suggests that the MP’s case might never be revisited, at least, not in the foreseeable future. It would be recalled that the US, once upon a time, requested for the extradition of the late Grace Coleman, MP for Effiduase-Asokore, also an NPP MP and former deputy Minister of Finance, for trial over a case of suspected forced labour involving her daughter, but the Kufuor regime never acted on the matter. Mrs. Coleman’s daughter has since been deported home after doing some time in jail.
The case against Nana Amoakoh, is that as the president of the company, he with Nick Zarbhanelian, chief financial officer, allegedly stole the money from Brooklyn-based Fone-A-Car and two of its lenders from 2002 to 2005.
Fourteen counts were placed on Nana Amoakoh’s head at the New York court, including stealing, money laundering and falsification of bank records. A warrant for his arrest was issued on May 17, 2007.
However, Nana Amoakoh has strongly denied the charges.
According to the charge sheet, the beleaguered MP stole over $1m from Fone-A-Car when he was its president from August 16, 2002 to July 6, 2005.
He assumed the presidency of the car services company in 1990.
The prosecution indicated that after Nana Amoakoh had resigned, other directors noted that money running into over $1 million was missing from Fone-A-Car’s various accounts and that the suspect had made unauthorized transfers of thousands of dollars from the company’s accounts into his personal accounts.
When the MP was asked, he was said to have admitted to the theft and added that he used part of the money to take care of his sick sister, and the rest on his parliamentary campaign in Ghana.
Asiedu and Zarbhanelian, Fone-A-Car's chief financial officer, allegedly stole cheques for about $700,000 written by Manhattan clients, including investment banks and law firms, for car services, Morgenthau said.
He was also accused of writing more than $30,000 worth of cheques from a Fone-A-Car account for deposit into the bank account of his girlfriend, Sebastiana Paul of Brooklyn, who is also a defendant in the indictment.
Besides stealing from Fone-A-Car, which had been in business for more than 20 years, Zarbhanelian of Fort Lee, New Jersey, allegedly stole more than $300,000 from the Manhattan lending company, Rosenthal & Rosenthal Inc., the district attorney said.
To prevent Fone-A-Car from going bankrupt due to their thefts, the defendants contrived in 2004 to receive cash advances from Rosenthal against money the limo service was owed by clients, he said.
In fact, Fone-A-Car was not owed anything, Morgenthau said, but based on the invoices, Rosenthal lent Fone-A-Car the money, keeping the car service running and the defendants stealing.
Morgenthau observed that Asiedu, 52, and Zarbhanelian, 55, worked with Apurva Patel, 41, of Armonk, N.Y., to steal $325,000 from All Points Capital Corp., a financing and leasing company affiliated with North Fork Bank.
The limo company officers and Patel, founder of a New Jersey company that made dispatching and billing software for car services, provided false documents to All Points for a loan to buy $325,000 worth of the software, Morgenthau said.
Asiedu, Zarbhanelian and Patel are charged with second-degree grand larceny and money laundering, punishable by 15 years in prison upon conviction.
Paul, 43, is charged with third-degree grand larceny, punishable by seven years in prison.
Zarbhanelian, Patel and Paul pleaded not guilty at their arraignments in Manhattan's state Supreme Court. Bail for Zarbhanelian was set at $500,000. Patel's bail was set at $250,000, which he posted. Paul posted bail of $25,000 and was released.
