By Saio Marrah
The driver of a stolen military ambulance has testified before Principal magistrate, Mark Ngegba that an engine and gearbox found in possession of an accused, Prince Kamara, have the same serial number as that of the stolen vehicle.
Corporal Ibrahim Koroma, who is attached to the Joint Medical Unit (JMU), told the court that the vehicle was stolen sometime in January 2022 when his boss, Warrant Officer Class two Umaru K. Turay, ordered him to collect a corpse at Waterloo upon the request of a minister whom the witness did not name.
According to him, when he arrived at the point where he was supposed to pick up the corpse, somebody introduced himself to him as the minister who asked for the ambulance. He said the minister told him that the deceased was a secret society person and that other members of that society should be allowed to accompany the corpse in the ambulance.
The witness said he rejected that on the grounds that he was instructed to collect only the corpse and that if he accepted passengers in the vehicle, he would have acted contrary to the Military‘s Standing Orders.
The witness said that at that point he pulled out his phone to make a call to his boss and inform him about the situation. Corporal Koroma said he was suddenly forcefully pushed to the ground and became unconscious.
He told the court that on regaining consciousness, he realized that the ambulance was nowhere to be seen and he immediately informed his boss and then went on a search for the vehicle but he was unsuccessful.
The prosecution witness said he and his immediate boss were arrested and locked up and that they made a statement to the CID.
The prosecution alleges that the 37 –year- old accused, a mechanic of Mango Farm in Waterloo, received the stolen military Toyota Land Cruiser Ambulance with the registration number 70SL79.
Copyright © 2023 Politico Online (01/03/23)
