William Ato Essien, the troubled founder and former CEO of the collapsed Capital Bank, has taken his struggle to the Supreme Court in an effort to have his trial put on hold while his appeal is being decided.
His attorney has appealed the High Court's decision to enter an audio recording of an altercation between the accused and the Special Investigative Team as evidence, claiming that doing so will harm his client's case.
He attempted to persuade the court to postpone action while the Court of Appeal decides the case, but the motion made by the accused's attorney, Baffour Gyau Bonsu Ashia, was denied by the court, which was presided over by Court of Appeal Justice Eric Kyei Baffour.
The Supreme Court has already received two petitions from his attorney, the first of which asks for permission to submit the application for a stay of the proceedings and the second of which is a substantive application for a stay of the proceedings. For today, both have been corrected.
Last Thursday, the court denied his attorney's request to halt the case while his appeal against the admission of an audio tape into evidence was being heard.
On June 9, 2022, the court allowed an audio recording of an altercation between Ato Essien and the Special Investigations Team during his questioning as part of the inquiry to be heard in court.
Rev. Fitzgerald Odonkor, one of the two defendants accused of stealing from the GH620 million the Bank of Ghana gave the bankrupt bank as liquidity assistance, attended the audio. He is one of the two defendants on trial with Ato Essien.
Fitzgerald Odonkor, the former managing director of the closed bank, Ato Essien, and Tetteh Nettey, the former managing director of MC Management Services, which is controlled by Mr. Essien, are all accused of conspiring to steal and stealing.
Mr. Ashia stated that the motion creates significant legal problems for the appellate court to decide, and that it also raises unique circumstances to support granting the request for a trial stay until resolution of the appeal.
The material "shows that he was admonished before he spoke, and that he talked in the presence of a lawyer and a state attorney," Justice Kyei Baffour said in his decision. It cannot be true that the interlocutory appeal presents important legal concerns. I reject the application since it has no merit at all.
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