Ghana

ABSTRACT

This thesis seeks to extend the literature on prosecution from a non-western country – Ghana – where little or nothing is known about prosecution, especially in the case of police officers acting as prosecutors. The objectives of the study are to explore the process involved in prosecution by the police, determine their knowledge level concerning laws they work with, ascertain the level of cooperation of victims, witnesses and defence lawyers, and find challenges of the job of prosecution without legal training. Using a combination of one-to-one interviews with prosecutors from the Ghanaian cities of Accra and Kumasi, the Director of Public Prosecution, and a focus group discussion of senior police-prosecutors based at the police headquarters in Accra, the research aims to explore the role of the police officer as a prosecutor. The findings indicate that there are no formal guidelines for police prosecution, especially in pre-trial practice. There is a high level of cooperation from victims and to some extent witnesses. Defence lawyers were more frequently described as a ‘headache’, with interviewees attributing delays in the courts to their tactics. Another finding established by the study is that the public perception of police and judicial corruption exists, with most interviewees admitting to corruption in both institutions. Workload was also established to be higher in Accra than Kumasi, although the population in Kumasi is higher than that of Accra. It is argued in this thesis that police prosecution is not properly regulated and decisions are taken based on prosecutors’ absolute discretion, which sometimes could lead to miscarriage of justice. It is recommended that actions be taken to recruit trained lawyers to take over the prosecution functions of the police and/or serious and conscious efforts should be made to train and regulate police-prosecutors in Ghana. KEY WORDS: Police Prosecutors, Ghana, Corruption, Defence Lawyers, Prosecution