Koforidua Circuit Court has sentenced a 43-year-old fetish priest to 15 years imprisonment with hard labour for possessing counterfeit money in an attempt to defraud the public.
He was charged with preparation to commit crime to wit defrauding.
The prosecutor, Chief Inspector Solomon Keelson told the court that the complainant is Inspector Nelson Nadutey, a police officer stationed at Central Police station whilst the accused Richard Vormowor a.k.a Nana Buame, 43, a fetish priest and a resident of Zongo, Koforidua.
The prosecutor said, in recent time, the Koforidua district command has been receiving many complaints of money doubling fraud and hence have been on high alert.
On April 5, 2022 at 1:00 pm, whilst Inspector Nelson and other police personnel were on duty at a checkpoint at Nkurakan Police barrier, a Hyundai minibus approached with the accused aboard the vehicle heading towards Koforidua.
The vehicle was stopped by police and searched. Seven(7) bundles of Ghc20 cedis notes and two(2) bundles of Ghc10 cedis notes suspected to be counterfeit belonging to the suspect were retrieved and arrested.
The accused admitted that the monies were fake and that, the bundles were made up of white papers he cut into sizes of the money notes embossed with the currency to look like original notes.
An investigation later revealed that the accused was on his way to defraud unsuspecting individuals with the trick of money doubling.
He was arraigned in court where he pleaded guilty and hence sentenced on his own plea.
The judge ordered for the fake money notes to be burnt.
