Conviction reversed! – Liberia news The New Dawn Liberia, premier resource for latest news

Liberia’s Supreme Court says the indictment and subsequent prosecution of the former Chief Justice and her family members were based on circumstantial evidence.

By Lincoln G. Peters

Monrovia, August 29, 2024: Liberia’s Supreme Court has set free the country’s former Chief Justice Cllr. Gloria Musu Scott and three of her family members overturned a lower court’s lifetime sentencing of the accused.

“Wherefore, and in view of the foregoing, the final ruling of the trial court confirming the jurors’ verdict is hereby reversed,” Chief Justice Sie-A-Nyene G. Yuoh said on Wednesday, August 28, 2024.

The full bench of the nation’s highest court ordered the immediate release from dentation of Cllr. Scott, and Gertrude Newton, Alice Johnson, and Rebecca Youdeh Wisner.

By this decision, the Supreme Court reversed Criminal Court “A” Judge Roosevelt Z. Willie’s sentencing of the accused to lifetime imprisonment on January 9, 2024, for the brutal murder of Cllr. Scott’s nice, Charloe Musu.

Throughout their trial, the accused denied any links to the murder and demanded the investigation of former Monrovia Mayor Jefferson T. Koijee, for allegedly ordering Varlee Telleh to carry out the attack. Koijee and Telleh denied the claim.

Before Charloe’s death, the former Chief Justice had reported two separate attacks on her home, but the authorities did nothing to prevent further attacks before Charloe was brutally murdered.

After hearing the appeal against their conviction, Liberia’s Supreme Court said the indictment and subsequent prosecution of the accused were based on circumstantial evidence. 

The court, therefore, restored their civil rights, liberty, and all other constitutional rights and statutory rights.

They have been detained at the Monrovia Central Prison throughout the judicial process following their arrest last year for murder, criminal conspiracy, and making false statements to law enforcement officers.

But they were brought out of the prison compound and greeted by a jubilant crowd outside the prison facilities in central Monrovia.

Chief Justice Yuoh delivered the Supreme Court’s ruling in the murder case, saying the defendants were released based on the government’s failure to establish their connection to the crime.

She said the government failed to establish that the accused committed the crimes charged.

Chief Justice Yuoh said the prosecutors did not meet the burden of proof to warrant the conviction of the defendants.

“Wherefore, and in view of the foregoing, the final ruling of the trial court confirming the jurors’ verdict is hereby reversed,” said Chief Justice Yuoh.

Considering the evidence in the case and the law, the Supreme Court said it’s the law that the standard proof to warrant a conviction in a criminal case is to prove beyond reasonable doubt.

Throughout the trial, the Supreme Court found that the State bragged in establishing all elements of the crimes charged.

The court noted that the verdict presented by the jurors can be set aside if it does not match the weight of the evidence.

The state having totally relied on circumstantial evidence and failed to meet the standard as required by law, the Supreme Court noted that the verdict could be set aside.

Following the trial at Criminal Court “A” last year, eleven out of twelve jurors on the panel concurred through a verdict handed Thursday, 21 December 2023, that the accused were responsible for Charloe Musu’s murder.

On their way out of prison, their supporters sang different traditional songs with roots from Liberia’s southeast, particularly the Grebo tribe, where Cllr. Scott and her family hail from.

The former Chief Justice waved to the jubilant crowd but did not speak to the media immediately. She was driven away in a vehicle belonging to Montserrado County Electoral District #8 Representative Mr. Prince Toles.

Maryland County Senator Mr. Gble-bo Brown also escorted her.