By Janet A Sesay
A final oral address in respect of the trial of Alfred Paolo Conteh has been made by the lead defence counsel, Dr Abdulai O. Conteh who urged the court to acquit and discharge the accused.
The call for acquittal and discharge is premised on the prosecution’s failure to make out a case against the accused person.
The accused, Alfred Paolo Conteh has been answering to a charge of treason, the highest offence known to the criminal law.
In his address, Dr Abdulai Conteh reminded the court about the prosecution’s case against the accused which, he said, was to assassinate the President of the Republican of Sierra Leone.
However, the prosecution, Dr Conteh said, the prosecutors had failed to prove their case against the accused person.
“The prosecution has failed to dispense the burden of truth against the first accused, Major Alfred Paolo Conteh,” he submitted.
Dr Conteh argued that regardless of the charge or the place of trial, it is for the prosecution to prove the guilt of the accused.
“Major Alfred Paolo Conteh bears no burden on the charge he was brought for in court,” he submitted.
The accused, Dr Conteh said, chose to give evidence in court noting that he brought a witness that testified on what exactly happened at State House.
“The accused, Alfred Paolo Conteh bears no burden and has not found been guilty of what he is charge for,” he submitted.
The prosecution, he said, had not reached the standard of proof for a charge of treason and that the accused should be acquitted and discharged.
In his submission, the lead defence counsel reminded the court that the whole of the prosecution’s case from start to end indicated that a brown bag was found at State House.
Based upon the founding of the brown bag, Dr Conteh said, the prosecution filed a case of treason against the accused.
He also submitted that the accused did not go to State House freely, but was invited by the President to tap on his experience in fighting the Corona Virus pandemic.
Dr Conteh also told the court that the first accused was never, at any moment, alone with the President making it hard to believe the prosecution’s claim of the accused wanting to assassinate the President.
“To have a weapon at State House does not amount to treason,” he argued.
The lead defence counsel made reference to the Treason Act, which he said, stipulated that treason can be committed by more than one person but the prosecution brought one person in a case of treason.
He said the evidence of the prosecution did not say that the accused went near the president or had a knife in his pocket to harm him.
“All their case is about a brown bag at State House,” he submitted.
He said, with respect to the jurors, it is quite a stretch of imagination to find a brown bag at State House and refer to it as treason.
“The offence of treason ranks the highest in the land and should not be charged lightly. One man cannot be charged with treason,” he emphasised.
In his effort to show the court that one person cannot be roped for a treason charge, Dr Conteh made reference to the country’s first treason case in1968.
“There were 12 accused persons standing trial and presented before the court. There was nothing before the court to show that in the current case there is a group waiting in the wind to rejoice with the accused, Major Paolo Conteh,” he submitted.
“No one man on his own can overthrow a government,” he emphasised.
Dr Conteh further informed the court that treason, in law, is to overthrow a government by unlawful means but said again treason in political experience has never been undertaken by a solitary man.
Before the jurors can convict for treason, Dr Conteh argued that, the prosecution must have led evidence in court to show that the accused was prepared to overthrow the government by unlawful means.
Touching on the area of licence of the pistols, Dr Conteh said the prosecution wanted the jurors to believe that the accused renewed his licence as he was planning to overthrow the government.
The accused, he Dr Conteh went on, went to the Small Arms Commission to renew his license on 3rd March this year.
He told the court that the first accused was not a soothsayer to know that he was going to attend a meeting at State House on 16th and 19th March this year.
“The accused, Alfred Paolo Conteh is just an innocent law abiding citizen,” he submitted.
Mr Conteh said to the jurors that they are not fools and they should not allowed anybody to make them fools and the first accused major Alfred Paolo Conteh served his country dutifully was retired with the rank of Major.
“Only a demented fool will embark on a mission to assassinate the President,” he submitted.
He said the meeting the accused attended was not a one-to-one meeting with the President but other people were invited too.
“The prosecution wanted the jurors to convict the first accused, Alfred Paolo Conteh for a crime he did not commit,” he submitted.
Dr Conteh reminded the court about the cross examination conducted by Adrian Fisher during which he accused Paolo Conteh of intending to overthrow President Maada Bio because he overthrew his uncle, Late President Joseph Saidu Momoh.
“The prosecution has failed to establish any motive that the accused, Alfred Paolo Conteh went to State House to harm the president,” he said.
He told the court that the accused, Alfred Paolo Conteh possessed the weapon purely to protect himself as an ex-minister.
In light of the foregoing, Dr Conteh urged the jurors to dismiss the case arguing that there is no evidence to show that the accused wanted to commit treason.
The lead counsel told the court that what was clear on 19th March this year, the accused handed over his bag to the security officers, and nobody intercepted him as alleged by the prosecution .
He also told the court that when the accused initially visited State House, there was no notice that was written: ‘FORBIDDEN WEAPON,’ but it was later put there when the trial commenced.
“Don’t let anyone take you for for fools, it will be an insult to your intelligence,” Dr Conteh told the jurors.
Dr Conteh regretted that the jurors had not benefited on other relevant issues like the CCTV footage requested by the defense to be brought to court, a requested which the prosecution hotly opposed owing to national security.
He said the video footage would have helped the court to know what transpired between the accused and the Presidential guards at State House.
Dr Conteh also reminded the court that the accused’s licence of the pistol was attested to by the testimony of Superintendent Mohamed Kuba Allieu.
Dr Conteh’s reference to the licence of the pistol is to tell the court that the accused lawfully acquired the pistol and that it is meant for his personal protection.
He said the prosecution fails to lay evidence in respect of the eleventh count about a public place.
“The prosecution did not lead to show what a public place is as State House is not a public place but it is a restricted area,” he submitted.
He said no evidence was before the court from the Small arms commission that the accused did not have a valid license for his pistol.
In his reply to the submission of the lead defence, one of the prosecutors, Adrian Fisher told the court there were several issues that the defence failed to address on noting that the law of treason is dealt with by the court as set out in the Treason Act.
He said the argument put forward by the defence that one man cannot commit treason is “laughable.”
“As common sense can show, one man can do a lot of damage in the act of treason, and for the defence to say that one man cannot be charged for treason makes no sense, and it is an insult to the intelligence of the jurors,” Fisher submitted.
Counsel Fisher told the court that being 63- year old or not, the accused was on a mission at State House and that during cross-examination he asked if he saw Bazuga guns at State House to which the accused answered in the negative. He therefore urged the jurors to look at the accused not as an ordinary man but a trained soldier who spent two years in Libya on a training and had very good experience in handling a gun.
He also submitted that the first accused told the court that he was not happy when he left the army as his uncle was overthrown.
Counsel Fisher made reference to the accused’s statement that had his uncle remained President, he would have been the Chief of Defence Staff at that time.
The state counsel also quoted the accused to have said one of those who overthrew his uncle is President Julius Maada Bio.
“The prosecution’s case was a plan and that plan was masterminded by the accused and that the plan failed because PW-2 called the accused to come down and scan his bag and intercepted him,” Counsel Fisher submitted.
State counsel further submitted that the accused was excited to meet the President simply because he had a gun.
“The accused said when he left office he had never been attacked and why did he keep carrying a gun around because nobody cared about him,” Counsel Fisher enquired.
Counsel Fisher also argued that it was not in the culture of Sierra Leoneans to attack people and that claim of the accused of carrying a gun to protect himself because his securities had been withdrawn from him is simply false.
“Nowhere in the world that a former minister would be entitled to security,” he submitted.
Counsel Fisher also told the court that the first accused, on two occasions at State House, did not surrender his gun at the gate and his defence witness told the court that at the gate that his vehicle was searched.
“Why on earth that the first accused should not be searched and took the gun inside without declaring it at the gate,” he told the court.
State Counsel also reminded the court that the first accused is a military man, former Minister of Defence and Internal Affairs and also a lawyer.
The accused, Counsel Fisher said, knew the rule that he should not enter State House with a gun, but counsel said, the accused entered there with a gun and bypassed the scanner and later claimed that he handed the bag to the security personnel.
He said the first accused was intercepted at the reception desk to put his bag on the scanner. When asked as to whether he saw police constable Vackie, Counsel Fisher went on, he said no because his mind was not focused on the police officer but to go upstairs.
Responding to the submission on the CCTV footage, Counsel Fisher said, the first accused had already told the court that he bypassed the scanner and later handed over his brown bag to the officer.
“What else could the CCTV do when the accused had agreed that he bypassed the scanner,” he wondered.
Adrian Fisher continued that if the first accused voluntarily handed over his bag to the officers, they would not have informed their boss.
Because he was intercepted, Counsel Fisher said, that was why they informed their boss noting that there was no voluntarism there.
He furthered submitted that the defence stated that there was no evidence of importation but the first accused said the pistols were brought in from America by his Nephew.
“The act is importation because there is no factory in Sierra Leone that produces guns,” state counsel submitted.
Counsel Fisher also informed the court that the accused, in his testimony, said that he did not remember who he gave his weapon between the two officers sitting at the reception desk.
“It is not credible. It is a laughable stock as a former Minister and trained soldier cannot remember who he gave his bag even when the officers came to testify in court,” he said.
Counsel Fisher told the court that the accused was in a confused state, and that the guilt of what he did was what led him to shed tears in court.
Submitting on the conduct of the second accused, Counsel Fisher said, he had been a Deputy Commissioner of Small Arms Commission for twelve years and he knew the procedures of obtaining a license.
He said the second accused refused to follow the procedure and issued license to the accused based on friendship.
He said the second accused had nothing more but the jurors to pass valid verdict on the second accused because of his conduct.
He said the third accused Prince George Hughes is a dishonest man as he supposed to be a man of integrity but stated in the form when issuing the license to the accused that he had known him for 30 years.
In the second form, counsel said, the third accused indicated that he had known the first accused for sixty years.
Counsel Fisher ended his reply by telling the jurors that their duty is to pass guilty verdict on all three accused persons on behalf of the people of Sierra Leone.
The matter continues today.