court fines drivers for using unlicensed vehicles at night

A Kumasi circuit court on Monday, fined five drivers to a total of GHC3, 000.00 or in default, spend 12 months in jail for driving vehicles with trial numbers beyond the stipulated time. Cars with trial number plates are expected to move on the road between the hours of 6am and 7pm. All the five drivers were arrested between the hours of 8:00 pm and 9:00 pm between April 26 and 28, 2013 at Tafo, a suburb of Kumasi during a special exercise by the District Patrol team of Ashanti Regional Police command to clamp down on criminal cases and motor traffic offences. They convict are Ernest Asiedu, Neem Adam, George Annor, Prince Yeboah and Tieku Osei Hwidie and were each fined GHC600.00 for driving their vehicles with DV number plates beyond the 7pm hour as stipulated by law. They all pleaded guilty to the charge and were convicted on their own plea by the court presided over Mr. D. W. P. Amedior. According to the prosecutor, Chief Inspector James Ameka, told the court that the convicts were arrested by a team of officers from the patrol team during an exercise to clamp down on criminal who used unregistered cars to commit crimes within the metropolis. He said during the exercise, the convicts were arrested at Tafo using trial number plate vehicles beyond the stipulated time. In a related development, the same court fined Kwadwo Sarpong, a sprayer, GHC360.00 for threatening to curse a police officer for arresting him, driving without license, resisting lawful arrest and driving DV vehicle without a log book. He pleaded guilty to all the four counts. He however, explained to the court that he was a sprayer stationed at Suame and was given the said vehicle to spray but due to the ongoing load shedding, could not finish the work and had to take the car home. According to him, he was only sending the car to his workshop when he was arrested. However, Mr. Ameka told the court that when the convict was arrested and was asked to drive to the Suame police station, on the way to the station, he stopped the car, switched off the engine, got down and started running. He said when he was apprehended and sent to the police station, he hurled insults on the arresting officer and threaten to curse him if he got out of the case.