Court: Supreme Court of Ghana
Year: 1997
Principle(s): Criminal jurisdiction of Ghanaian Courts
Court: Supreme Court of Ghana
Year: 1961
Principle(s): Cheating is not stealing, which is crime. (cheating is not). Cheating may be a public wrong, but still not a crime. Cheating may also be morally objectionable, but that alone does not make it a crime.
Court: High Court of Ghana
Year: 1991
Principle(s): It is indeed a fundamental right of every individual that he shall not be punished for any offences which had not been clearly set out and the punishment thereon equally laid down.
Court: Supreme Court
Year: 1997-98
Principle(s): Defaulting on repaying a debt is not a criminal offence, merely a breach of contract and the remedy lies in a civil suit; Police are not debt-collectors; A person cannot be arrested in place of another (e.g Arrest a son for the father's crime)
Court: Supreme Court of Ghana
Year: 1999-2000
Principle(s): Crimes as offences against the state; divisions of crime;
Court: Court
Year:
Principle(s): Principal ingredient in an attempted murder is an intent to kill, which is a question of fact. Without the mens rea (intent) to kill, causing death to another is not murder.
Court: Supreme Court of Ghana
Year: 2014
Principle(s): Elements of rape; meaning of carnal knowledge
Court: High Court
Year: 1972
Principle(s): The same act can constitute two different offences, and punishment for each offence does not constitute double jeopardy. The appellant was customarily punished through destoolment, but can still be punished for his criminal offence of failing to attend a Traditional Council meeting.
Court: High Court
Year: 1992
Principle(s): An act may be immoral and contrary to customary law, but this alone does not make it a crime.
Court: Supreme Court
Year: 1962
Principle(s): A person shall not be punished for an offence under a repealed statute if the act happens after the repeal.
Court: High Court
Year: 1965
Principle(s): It is not the law that a person cannot be punished twice for the same act. The law is that a person cannot be punished twice for the same offence.
Court: High Court
Year: 1979
Principle(s): If evidence is obtained in an improper man, the courts will not admit such evidence from the prosecution. This is to protect the liberties of suspects and discourage improper investigative methods.
Court: Supreme Court
Year: 1997-98
Principle(s): When a law defining an offence is repealed (without a saving provision) during trial and before conviction, the trial ought to be discontinued as there would be no written law under which the accused could be punished; Meaning of principles of legality per Acquah JSC
Court: High Court
Year: 1968
Principle(s): What is approved by customary law may constitute a criminal offence.
Court: Court of Appeal
Year: 1999-2000
Principle(s): When a person has been wrongly convicted and the trial is declared null and void, the court will not order a retrial on appeal if the appellant has already been imprisoned for a long time, as doing so may cause the accused to punished twice (first punishment was from the wrong conviction, a second punishment may occur from a proper conviction).
Court: West African Court of Appeal
Year: 1948
Principle(s): When a person has been convicted or acquitted by a body that is not a court of competent jurisdiction, he can be tried again by a court of competent jurisdiciton.
Court: Court
Year: 1955
Principle(s): Automatism; Absence of mens rea would lead to a verdict of not guilty
Court: Court
Year: 1918
Principle(s): Failing to act when one has a duty to act, can constitute the actus reus for a crime
Court: Court
Year: 1893
Principle(s): An omission would constitute an actus reus for an offence when a person has a duty to act yet they fail to act.
Court: Court
Year: 1902
Principle(s): Contractual obligations can give rise to a duty to act to prevent harm
Court: Court
Year: 1981
Principle(s): An accused would be held to have caused an event if his acts are the operating and substantial cause of the harm suffered by the victim. Novus actus interveniens
Court: Court
Year: 1956
Principle(s): Medical treatment will break the chain of causation if it was of such nature that it became the operating and substantial cause of death
Court: Court
Year:
Principle(s): Causing an event through an involuntary agent does not make the involuntary agent responsible for causing the event. Rather, the event is said to be caused by the party that caused the involuntary agent to cause the event. A child, animal, is an involuntary agent
Court: Court
Year: 1959
Principle(s): Legal causation: operating and substantial cause. For the chain of causation to be broken, the new intervening act must be of such nature to overshadow the initial act.
Court: Court
Year: 1975
Principle(s): Take your victim as you find them. The personal beliefs of a person which causes death after an initial wound, does not break the chain of causation.
Court: Court
Year: 1974
Principle(s): A person can only be guilty for an event if he caused the event
Court: Court of Appeal
Year: 1967
Principle(s): It is not sufficient to prove that the act of the accused person could have caused death; the evidence must show that the act of the accused did cause the death of the deceased or accelerated his death, and it must also exclude the possibility of’ death having been due to some other cause.
Court: Court of Appeal
Year: 1984-86
Principle(s): In order to show causation, the prosecution must present evidence to show that the acts of the accused actually caused the death of the deceased. If the evidence is such that it leaves room for other possible causes of death, the prosectution would have failed in establishing causation.
Court: Court
Year: 1573
Principle(s): Causing an event through an involuntary agent. Transferred intent
Court: Court
Year: 1865
Principle(s): When deciding causation, the law ignores insignificant acts. de minimis non curat lex. The act of the accused must be the substantial cause of the event
Court: Court
Year: 1908
Principle(s): Take your victim as you find them. A victim’s unknown medical condition does not break the chain of causation
Court: Court
Year: 1971
Principle(s): Acts that are reasonably foreseeable do not break the chain of causation.
Court: Court
Year: 1841
Principle(s): But for test to establish causation. Refusal to accept medical treatment does not break the chain of causation
Court: Court of Appeal
Year: 1960
Principle(s): The distinction between murder and manslaughter is the intent with which an act which caused death was done; Intent may (in some cases) be determined by a consideration of circumstantial evidence.
Court: Court of Appeal
Year: 1977
Principle(s): Intention to kill may be inferred from circumstances such as the weapon used. The fact that a person starts a fight does not mean they have an intention to kill.
Court: Court of Appeal
Year: 1992-93
Principle(s): Weapon used to kill may be taken as evidence of an intention to kill. A gun is a lethal weapon and if shot at another, is evidence of an intention to kill
Court: Court of Appeal
Year: 1984-86
Principle(s): Reckless intent; Section 11(3) of Act 29
Court: Supreme Court
Year: 1963
Principle(s): Subjective test for assessing intent of an accused.
Court: Supreme Court
Year: 1964
Principle(s): Intent to cause harm is not the same as an intent to cause death (different types of intent); difference between murder and manslaughter in Ghana.
Court: Court
Year: 1875
Principle(s): Certain crimes do not require proof of mens rea or intention. These are strict liability offences
Court: Supreme Court
Year: 2015
Principle(s): All persons suspected of committing a crime are presumed innocent under article 19(2)(c) of the 1992 Constitution. Consequently, they should not suffer punishment until their guilt is established.
Court: Supreme Court
Year:
Principle(s): 1. Article 19(11) merely outlawed common law and customary law crimes that have not been preserved in statutory law. 2. Failing to define the words in an offence does not mean the offence is not defined in a written law.
Court: Supreme Court
Year: 2024
Principle(s): 1. Sexual intercourse between a man and a woman is the only sexual intercourse recognised under Ghanaian law. 2. Sexual intercourse between a man and a woman is only permissible if it involves penetration of the vagina by the penis. Penetration per anus, use of sex toys, or inanimate objects are unlawful. 3. Any sexual intercourse that does not involve the penetration of the penis into the female vagina is unnatural carnal knowledge and is criminal. 4. Any carnal knowledge of an animal by a human is unnatural carnal law. 5. Meaning of Crime: Crime is conduct which the state, through law, designates as prohibited and expresses a penal consequence for it’s occurrence.