Behind the high concrete walls of the Tamale Prisons, a 40-year-old man sticks his hand out through the rusty iron bars in front of his cell, asking to be served a meal.

Having spent nearly eight years in the yard, Halidu Bukari is the longest serving remand prisoner at the Tamale Prisons. He was thrown into jail in connection with the death of his daughter who was found dead near a neighbour’s house. Halidu was accused of killing his own daughter.

Wearing a torn, dirty white T-shirt, Bukari said he did not commit the crime; that he could not have killed his own daughter, a best friend.

Bukari cannot be freed by the prison. His case must be determined by the courts. But for eight years, he’s never been sent to court again after his first appearance.

"They took me to court and accused me of killing my daughter. In 2011 they brought back the case to the High Court here and the Attorney General brought a bill of indictment and in it they said I intentionally killed my daughter. They took my father as a witness, my step mother as a witness, my wife as a witness but since the day they arrested me, none of them has come to court as a witness. And after that my step-mother, passed away last two years. How the matter came, truly I don’t know what is going on,” Bukari said.

“They are not talking like my wife and I fought but now they are accusing me of killing my daughter.”

This story and many others from prisons across the country are the focus of JoyNews’ Hotline documentary dubbed “Locked and Forgotten”. In the documentary, Seth Kwame Boateng tells the stories of shock, pain and sheer neglect of possibly innocent people spending productive hours behind bars.