Dr Osei Owusu-Afriyie, an Assistant Commissioner of Police and pathologist at the Ghana Police Hospital testified before the Accra High Court that 10-year-old Ishmael Mensah Abdullah, who was killed at Kasoa for suspected money rituals, was buried alive.
The pathologist stated that the victim died from “severe head injury from blunt trauma” and that he was not dead when the body was being buried.
As the seventh prosecution witness to testify, Dr. Osei Owusu-Afriyie informed the Accra High Court, presided over by Justice Lydia Osei Marfo, that “asphyxiation (inability to breathe)” was the cause of death.
He added that the premature burial that followed a blunt head injury was the reason why a person’s body becomes “blue” and their lungs become hyperinflated when they are unable to breathe.
Abdullah was allegedly their friend. Two teenagers, a 15-year-old juvenile and an 18-year-old young offender (both names withheld), have been charged with his death.
Despite the 15-year-old’s admission of guilt during the plea negotiations, the court entered a not-guilty plea on his behalf because the law requires the jury to decide the case after a full trial.
However, the 18-year-old, who was accused of plotting to murder the 15-year-old, had always refuted the accusations.
