FIVE people who robbed the owner of their favourite drinking bar, Bula Spot at Mampong, a suburb of Krobo- Odumase in the Eastern Region, have been sentenced to 20 years imprisonment each in hard labour by a Koforidua Circuit Court.
The five, Teye Francis, 20, unemployed, Sulley Malik, 27, labourer, Paul Amoatey, 34, auto-mechanic, Daniel Teye,25, mechanic and Kwame Joseph, 25, were charged on two counts each of conspiracy to commit robbery and robbery.
They pleaded not guilty to the charges, but the court presided over by Mr. Ebenezer Osei Darko, found them guilty and jailed them accordingly.
Prosecuting, Assistant State Attorney, Cyril Boateng Keteku, said all the convicts were residents of Agormenya.
He said on May 4, the convicts together with other accomplices, now at large, went to the complainants’ drinking bar wielding sticks and cutlasses and demanded for money, being the previous night’s sales.
The victims, Rose Dometey and Juliana Amartey, who knew some of the convicts, thought they were joking and as such ignored them.
He said the convicts then subjected the complainants to severe beatings and made them to lie on the floor.
They further destroyed an ice chest valued at GH¢80 containing assorted drinks and fried meat.
The complainants who realised that the convicts were not joking, handed over GH¢1,400 being the sales they made the previous day to them.
The convicts also carried away an unspecified amount of coins being kept in a small bowl into a polythene bag and bolted.
The victims later reported the incident to the police who issued medical forms to them to attend hospital.
The police, the prosecution said, later had a tip off that one of the convicts, Sulley was lurking around the Tema Harbour and they arrested him. Subsequently, he led them to arrest the other three convicts.
The fifth convict was arrested at Somanya.