An Accra Circuit Court has acquitted and discharged four persons in a case in which they were accused by Black Stars Captain, Asamoah Gyan, of attempting to extort money from him through blackmail over an alleged rape and sodomy incident purportedly committed by the footballer.
The judge dismissed the matter on Wednesday, 20 March 2019 because the prosecution failed to establish a prima facie case.
The four, Sarah Kwablah, Anthony Osarfo, Chris Handler and Ekow Micah, for the last three years, have been facing prosecution for conspiring to commit the alleged crime after Ms Kwablah made the rape allegation against Asamoah Gyan.
The presiding judge, Afia Agbanu Kumador, in her ruling on the submission of a no-case filed by the lawyers for the accused persons, stated that the prosecution failed to establish any prima facie matter.
Background
The Daily Guide newspaper published a story in June 2015, which alleged that Sarah Kwablah, a 21-year-old student at the time, wanted to blackmail Asamoah Gyan with a sex video involving the two of them.
Sarah Kwablah’s side of the story, was, however, not captured in that publication.
According to the paper, though it reached out to her via SMS, she failed to respond as of the time the paper went to bed.
Just after the publication, Sarah Kwablah approached Osarfo Anthony – then a writer for online media GHbase.com – and gave her side of the story, in which she claimed Asamoah Gyan raped and sodomised her. She claimed the incident was caught on CCTV in her house and accused the Daily Guide of twisting the narrative as “consensual sex” to favour the footballer.
Ms Kwablah then furnished Osarfo with all the WhatsApp chats between her and Gyan as well as still pictures of her blood-stained body as a result of the alleged rape and sodomy. She allegedly sent the same pictures to Gyan, which purportedly got the footballer alarmed, prompting him to apologise to the girl and plead with her not to let anyone know about the incident.
However, GHbase.com published more revelations on the alleged rape and sodomy incident.
Asamoah Gyan’s team allegedly contacted the site’s Editor, Chris Handler and Osarfo, and pleaded with them to stop the publication.
Gyan and his brother later accused Osarfo and the three others, of conspiring to extort money from the football star with their publications.
Osarfo Anthony, Chris Handler, Sarah Kwablah, and Ekow Micah were subsequently arrested, charged with conspiracy to extort money and arraigned.
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