Man, 53 arrested for fraud

Page 28: Daily Graphic, February 12, 2009.
Story: Albert K. Salia
A 53-year-old man, Prosper Akabutu, has been arrested by the police for allegedly defrauding two persons of GH¢100,000.
Akabutu’s accomplice, known to the police as Evangelist Kofi Nsiah, is, however, on the run.
The two are alleged to have sold a storey building and a parcel of land to two individuals under the assumed names of the property owners and absconded thereafter.
Briefing the Daily Graphic in an Accra, the Public Affairs Officer of the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service, Chief Inspector J. B. Darkwah, said some time last month a man identified as Emmanuel Owusu, currently at large but believed to be Kofi Nsiah, introduced Akabutu to a Germany-based Ghanaian lady as Samuel Kodzo Kugbe, a transporter and owner of a storey building at Community 18 in Tema.
He said the lady, who had expressed interest in buying a property before returning to Germany, was convinced by the documentation presented to her covering the property.
The documents, he said, were a base of residential site issued by the Tema Development Corporation and registered in the name of Samuel Kodzo Kugbe and a contract of sale.
Chief Inspector Darkwah said Akabutu also made a photocopy of his purported voter ID card in the name of Samuel Kugbe, who is actually deceased, to the victim.
He said the victim accordingly paid GH¢88,000 to Akabutu to cover the cost of the property.
According to him, when two family members of the owner of the building saw the victim packing her belongings into the property, they informed her that the property was theirs and wondered how she got access to the place.
Chief Inspector Darkwah said the woman then produced the purported documents to the family members but she was informed that the owner was deceased and that the family had no plans of selling it.
It was at that point that the victim realised that she had been defrauded and accordingly reported the matter to the police, he said.
He said just as the police started investigations into the case, another victim reported to the Property Fraud Unit that Akabutu, who had introduced himself as Charles Anum and owner of a parcel of land at Community 18, Tema, had sold the land to him at GH¢20,000.
Chief Inspector Darkwah said the victim told the police that Anum, with his accomplice, Kofi Nsiah, who had assumed the name Ernest Botchway, with purported documents covering the land, went into hiding after collecting GH¢12,000 from him.
He said the victim paid the money after an estate agent through whom he had seen the advertisement had given him copies of the documents after Akabutu and Nsiah had demanded GH¢12,000 from him.
According to Chief Inspector Darkwah, it was during a search by the victim to confirm the ownership of the land that it was established that the land did not belong to Akabutu and Nsiah.
Surprisingly, he said, Akabutu and Nsiah had provided photocopies of their voter ID cards bearing the names Charles Anum and Ernest Botchway for him.