Email Gambia News to a friend
Print version
Comment on This Gambia News

Gambia: Sheriff Minteh's Death Rioter Convicted

One Yaye Rose Camara of London Corner was brought before Principal Magistrate Moses Richards of Kanifing Magistrates Court on Friday 25 May. She was charged with unlawful assembly in a manner that can cause civil unrest. She was not represented by a lawyer. When the charge was read she pleaded guilty. At the same time she denied that she and others assembled to march towards the Police Station to burn it. She told the court that they were only showing their anger and emotions in the way Sheriff Minteh lost his life. She was convicted on her plea of guilty and sentenced to a fine of D2, 500 (two thousand five hundred dalasis) or in default to imprisonment for a term of six months.

According to the police prosecutor 1748 First Class Constable Mballow, in the early hours of 9 May at Serrekunda London Corner, a group of people assembled themselves to attack the Serrekunda Police Station with intent to burn it. He said that the incident was provoked by the alleged killing of Sheriff Minteh by a police volunteer during a pursuit by the police task force in Serrekunda. He noted that the police urged the crowd to disperse so that they could do their investigation into the matter.

Mballow indicated that between 7:00am and 9:00am on the following day, the people regrouped and marched towards the Serrekunda Police Station with fire and wearing red head bands. He narrated that some who were arrested confessed to the police that it was the accused (Yaye Camara) who bought the red cloth for them to use as bands and asked them to march towards the police station.

Prosecutor Mballow noted that the accused person remained at large even though the police were looking for her since 9 May. He said that she was arrested on 21 May, but that she was not allowed police bail up to that day. Mballow said a cautionary statement and a voluntary statement were obtained from her. They were tendered in court and admitted in evidence as Exhibits A and B. In her plea of mitigation she pleaded to the court to temper justice with mercy on her. She said that her act was unlawful and she would never repeat it.

When delivering the judgment, Magistrate Richards said that her act is not only inimical to the breach of peace in the society but in the whole country. He said that she pleaded guilty without wasting the court's time and based on that he would not send her to jail but fine her. He therefore fined her the sum of D2,500 in default to serve six months in prison. He added that the punishment is a punitive one to deter others from doing the same act.