Mason defrauds farmers

Prestea, (W/R) Jan. 21, GNA - A 28- year-old mason, Kwadwo Owusu was on Monday sentenced to two years imprisonment in hard labour by the Prestea Magistrate Court, presided over by His Worship Mr. Benjamin Yaw Osei for forgery of documents and defrauding several farming communities in the Wassa West district in the Western Region.

He was sentenced on his plea and both sentences are to run consecutively.


Presenting the facts of the case, Inspector William Jonas Katapu of the Prestea Police Station said the accused was once employed by the Awutu Bawjiase Starch Factory as a labourer but was dismissed after sometime. Inspector Katapu said the accused having acquired knowledge of the operations of the Factory contacted a printing Press at Oda in the Eastern Region and managed to print official receipts with the address of Awutu Startch Factory.


Armed with these, the accused went to Oppong Valley and Damang, both farming communities on November 24 last year and introduced himself to the chief, Nana Datu Akomea of Damang as an agent from the Starch Factory, who has been sent to the area to register interested farmers to be given loans between two million and four million cedis by the government to enable them to cultivate more cassava to feed the factory at Awutu.


The prosecutor added that the accused also promised the farmers that, the government would soon establish one of the factories in the area for them to enable them to have ready market for their produce. Inspector Katapu said the accused started collecting fees ranging between two thousand and five thousand cedis and issued receipts covering them and was able to raise seven point three million cedis (7.300,000 cedis) from the farmers.

He said on December ninth, last year, the chief of Damang however, suspected the accused to be a fraudster and caused his arrest. The police managed to retrieve two receipts booklets and amount of 336, 000 cedis on him.


The accused was later charged with the offences to which he pleaded guilty and was sentenced on his own plea accordingly. Some of the victims who heard the news trooped to the court with the false receipts issued them by the accused.


The presiding Judge advised the farmers to be more cautious in their dealings with people, especially strangers who take advantage of their ignorance about the issues at stake to defraud them. Some of the farming communities were Awudua, Nkwanta, Ayensu Number One and two, Yareyeya, Huni Valley, Koranteng,Petepom, Kyekyewere.