Man's bag snatching conviction overturned: appeals court judge says CCTV 'clearly' showed another person

A 24-year-old Ghanaian man’s conviction for a snatch and grab theft - and the accompanying 30-month prison sentence - have been overturned on appeal, after a judge ruled that CCTV footage showed that he was clearly not the same person as the suspect.

In a judgement handed down on Tuesday, Madame Justice Consuelo Scerri Herrera, presiding over the Court of Criminal Appeal acquitted 24-year-old Ilajsu Seidu of the aggravated theft of a €2,000 gold necklace that had been snatched from around the neck of an 81-year-old woman, who had been walking with her husband along Triq il-Kungress Marjan, Marsa, in September 2022.

The victim had told the police that her assailant had been wearing a baseball cap, surgical mask, hoodie, and sweatpants all of which were described as “dark coloured.”

The police had analysed CCTV footage from the area, the court was told, which showed the perpetrator running towards Triq ix-Xemxija, turning towards Triq il-Jum, before crossing the Marsa/Ħamrun bypass on the pedestrian bridge.

Inspector Lydon Zammit, prosecuting, had testified that the suspect was then seen changing his outfit and putting a small item in his pocket - thought to be the necklace - whilst using an open-air lift. After crossing the road, the suspect is seen running towards some stables in Qormi.

In November 2023, the Court of Magistrates had declared Seidu to be guilty of theft, aggravated by means, amount, time and age of the victim and sentenced him for two and a half years in prison.

Subsequently, Seidu’s lawyers, Mario Mifsud and Nicholas Mifsud, had filed an appeal on the man’s behalf, arguing amongst other things, that the prosecution had failed to produce crucial eyewitnesses, namely the victim’s husband and four bystanders who had been near the victim when the theft took place.

No identification parade had been held by the police with the victim or the bystanders, pointed out the lawyers, “instead the police solely relied on their ability to identify the individual seen on the Marsa Bridge CCTV footage” which they pointed out, had not even captured the actual incident.

After his arrest, Seidu himself had also told the police that he was not the person shown in the footage.

Officers had questioned Seidu’s ex-girlfriend, who had told them that he was in custody at that time, having been arrested for drug-related offences during a police raid in Marsa a few days before. She had confirmed that a still image she had been shown of the suspect was Seidu, leading the police to seek him out and arrest him.

But on the witness stand, the woman claimed to have been in a paranoid state at the time, having been smoking crack cocaine for the previous 24 hours.

She told the judge that she had no recollection of the picture, but that she had told the police that it showed the defendant, but that in fact, it was not true.

Madam Justice Scerri Herrera observed that the prosecution evidence was “very scarce” and that it had failed to produce the victim’s husband or anyone else who the woman had said were accompanying her at the time. The victim had testified that two people had attempted to give chase, noted the court, but none of those persons had been asked to testify or identify the assailant.

The judge said no true identification of the assailant had taken place and that the police had only concluded that it was the accused because of what his ex-girlfriend had allegedly told them, also noting that she had given the court a different account of the events from the witness stand.

The identification of the defendant by the woman, in her state of mind, from a picture shown to her “was certainly not a strong identification, especially when applied to the principles that the court should follow when considering the identification of an assailant.”

The court then took it upon itself to examine the photo of the dark-skinned man purported to be the defendant that the police had exhibited in the acts of the case, explaining that it was doing so because the prosecution was basing its identification of Seidu on that photo.

The judge concluded that “it is evident from the examination carried out by the court itself that the accused is NOT the person shown in the picture. His colouring is less dark than that shown on the male in the picture. Also, his facial features are also different. The court cannot feel serene in deciding that the picture is a photo of the accused.”

The judge said she disagreed with the Court of Magistrate’s conclusion that the police “did a meticulous job in this case,” “Actually the court feels that the prosecution could have done so much more in relation to the identification of the accused. Also, it cannot understand [why], when the police had in their hands all the footage downloaded from the CCTVs in Marsa soon after the incident in September 2022, took so long to investigate and take the statement of the accused.”

Far more haste was to be expected, said the court, when taking into account the fact that the victim was 81-years-old. The victim ought not to have had to wait for five months before giving her account of events. The judge also pointed out that although the woman’s husband had been mentioned as being present in the police report on the incident, he had never been called to testify.  “Moreover, the victim, in her testimony, denies him being next to her when she was robbed,” added the judge, ruling that it was not safe and satisfactory to conclude that Seidu was the person who had committed the theft and therefore, acquitting him of all charges.

Lawyers Mario Mifsud and Nicholas Mifsud assisted the appellant.