Marie Aziz Tunde
The Medical Doctor who conducted Examination on Josephine Panyin Mensah at the Axim Government Hospital has told a Takoradi Circuit Court that he did not notice any postpartum sign on her after the various tests that were conducted.
Josephine Panyin Mensah is the supposed heavily pregnant woman in Takoradi who allegedly faked her kidnap and claimed her fresh baby was taken away.
The Circuit Court ‘A’ in Takoradi, presided over by His Honour Michael Ampadu, commenced the much-talked-about trial on January 6, 2022 during which Michael Simons and Agnes Essel, husband and mother of the accused told the Court that they physical saw the accused pregnant.
They spoke as the first and second prosecution witnesses in the case.
However, giving his testimony as the fifth prosecution witness in the case, Dr. Jerry James Abobrah, Medical Superintendent of the Axim Government Hospital made it clear that the various tests conducted, including that of the vagina, uterus and the abdomen among others, indicated that the accused was a healthy, non-pregnant premenopausal woman.
Giving his viva voce evidence, the Doctor indicated that the tests on the accused were conducted with assistance of about four Midwives and all the tests proved that the 28- year old woman had not given birth within six days that she went missing and resurfaced.
“Some physical evidence found on a woman who has given birth, like the darkened black line on the stomach which is still visible after giving birth, was not found. Her breast was flabby and the nipples not darkened as in the case of a woman who has just given birth”, he told the Court.
Ante-Natal Book:
The Medical Doctor told the Court that during interrogation after the accused was sent to the hospital as a patient on September 21, 2021, Josephine indicated that she was pregnant for 11 months before her alleged ordeal.
Dr. Abobrah said after Josephine narrated the ordeal she allegedly went through, he asked the accused for her AnteNatal Care (ANC) record book which is given to every pregnant woman.
He noted that the accused initially told him that her ANC record book was at home in Takoradi.
“Later, she said the book was lost because when she was going for her routine walk before she was allegedly kidnaped, she had the book on her so that when labour sets in at any time she can go straight to the hospital”, he told the Court.
He said the woman narrated that the unknown people who allegedly kidnaped her covered her mouth with cloth, making her unconscious and when she later became conscious she saw herself tied with a rope and in the midst of some other 21 pregnant women in a thick forest who were being killed.
He said the woman told him that she was there when one of the kidnappers told her to push and something fell from her vagina.
“I asked her what it was and she said she saw a live female baby and the baby cried once. I asked how the placenta was cut and she said ”by herself with her fingers”.
“I again asked the whereabouts of the baby and she said she didn’t know where she was taken to”, the doctor told the Court when he was led to give his evidence in Chief by the Prosecutor in the case, Superintendent Emmanuel Basintele.
Cross-Examination:
During Cross-Examination, the Lawyer for the accused, Fiifi Buckman asked the Doctor if he heard the brouhaha or the confusion on whether the woman was pregnant or not on radio after she was found.
Doctor Abobrah answered in the negative and explained that he was busy on the issue and did not have time to listen to the radio.
The Lawyer asked “the Police Medical Form was given to you on September 21, 2021 and it took you three days after the brouhaha before writing your report”.
The doctor answered in the affirmative. The case was adjourned to January 20, 2022 for Cross-Examination.
