Three staff of the Electoral Commission of Ghana and a student have been remanded for two weeks by the Circuit Court at Dansoman for allegedly stealing laptops and biometric devices belonging to the commission.

The three staff – Philip Tetteh, a labourer, Benjamin Fienyi, a security man and Joseph Blackson Adamadze, a database administrator have pleaded not guilty to their respective charges.

They were charged for conspiracy to steal and stealing. While Clifford Yeboah, 23, a student, was charged with dishonestly receiving.

He has also denied the charge before Her Honour Halima Abdul El Lawal Basit while the case has been adjourned to April 29.

They were remanded after the prosecution, led by Chief Inspector Christopher Wonder, prayed for time to conclude on investigations.

He submitted that, the accused persons, when granted bail, will interfere with investigations since they are yet to retrieve the remaining Dell laptops, which contain serious data.

Brief facts

Per the brief facts of the case, the complainants are officials of the Electoral Commission of Ghana (EC).

While the accused persons, Philip Tattey, Benjamin Fienyi, Joseph Blankson Adamadze and Clifford Yeboah are, a Labourer, security man, Database Administrator and student respectively.

Chief Inspt. Wonder said, all accused persons except Clifford Yeboah (4th Accused) are workers of the Electoral Commission of Ghana.

He said, on March 9, 2024, officers from the ICT Department of the Electoral Commission began conducting routine maintenance on the Biometrio Voter Registration (BVR) Kits.

He explained that, each of the kit boxes contain a laptop computer, printer, a scanner, battery and biometric device.

The prosecutor said, during the maintenance, the officials detected that five of the Dell Laptop computers had been stolen from their kit boxes

Chief Inspt. wonder told the Court that, a complaint was lodged with the National Security and in the course of investigation, all accused persons were arrested.

The prosecutor said, during investigation, three HP laptop computers, which value are not yet known, were retrieved from Clifford Yeboah (4th Accused).

He added that, one HP printer and three Biometric Verification Device (BVD) printer chargers were also retrieved from Benjamin Fienyi (2nd Accused).

The prosecutor said all retrieved items are properties of the Electoral Commission of Ghana.

According to him, investigations so far revealed that, in March 2023, the Commission engaged its casual workers and security men to remove some of their materials from the warehouse at the Commission’s old Head office at Ridge to one of their warehouses at Spintex.

He said, Benjamin (2nd Accused) and A3 (Joseph Blankson) planned to steal some of the printers.

In furtherance to their plan, Joseph stole the HP printer from one of the kit boxes and handed it over to Benjamin.

He said Benjamin also stole three Biometric Verification Device (BVD) printer chargers and sent them home.

Philip Tetteh, (1st Accused) on the other hand, stole three HP laptop computers from the kit boxes and gave same to Clifford Yeboah to keep and repair the remaining two for him.

He said the accused persons were charged and arraigned before this Honourable Court while investigation continues.