The Agona Swedru Circuit Court has jailed two armed rob­bers 50 years each with hard labour for robbing a taxi driver of his cab and murdering him later.

Emmanuel Adjei, aged 24, a bus conductor and Kofi Gyan, a 20-year-old unemployed, received 50 years each on two counts of conspiracy to commit crime and robbery. The sentences will run concurrently.

They pleaded guilty and the court, presided over by Ms Abigail Anima Asare, convicted them on their own pleas.

The two accused persons would after their sentences face murder charges at a higher court.

Prosecuting, Detective Police Officer Abudulai Mohamed said the compla>r.ant in the case was John Ashiley at Jei Krodua, near He said Mr. Ashiley on May 27, 2014 reported of his missing taxi cab and its driver, Odartey Lamptey, to the Kasoa Millennium City Police Station.

The police officer said on 28 May, 2014, police at the Millenni­um City Station got information that Lamptey had been found dead in the bush at Adadi, near Kasoa.

He said the police rushed to the scene and saw the body lying in the bush with marks on his neck and blood oozing from the nose, mouth and ears.

According to the prosecution, the body was later identified by the owner of the taxi cab as his driver.

He said the Kasoa police inten­sified their investigations into the matter and upon a tip-off, heard that Adjei was using the deceased's taxi cab at Suame in Kumasi in the Ashanti Region.

The prosecution told the court that on 18 September, 2014, the police went to Kumasi and arrest­ed the first accused (Adjei) and upon interrogations confessed that they committed the offence.

He said it came out from the police investigations that the two accused persons, who hail from Agona Odoben in the Asikuma- Odoben-Brakwa district, hired the services of the taxi driver on May 27,2014 at Kasoa for some errands at the area, but murdered the driv­er near Adadi and escaped with the vehicle.

The prosecutor told the court that the second accused, Kofi Gyan, was arrested at his hideout at Tabita, near Akim Akroso in the Eastern Region.

He said a post-mortem exami­nation by Dr. Simon Aporo at the Pathology Department of the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital, revealed that the deceased was strangulated to death.