The State v Marety Ame Gaidi (2002) N2256

• Jurisdiction: Papua New Guinea
• Court: National Court
• Citation: (2002) N2256
• Date: 01 August 2002
• Year: 2002

Full Title: The State v Marety Ame Gaidi (2002) N2256

National Court: Kandakasi J

Judgment Delivered: 1 August 2002

1 CRIMINAL LAW—Armed robbery—Identification only issue for trial—Eye witness talking face to face with accused taking about 3 minutes—Broad day light—Accused not masked—No reason to falsely testify against accused—No real challenge on witnesses ability to identify—Identification of accused at police station on sight of accused as the person he saw at scene of robbery—Circumstantial evidence including vehicle used during robbery support accused involvement in the robbery—Need to warn of the apparent dangers of purported identification—Court satisfied that the accused was positively identified as person involved in the robbery—Guilty verdict returned—Criminal Code s386.

2 John Beng v The State [1977] PNGLR 115, The State v Raphael Kimba Aki (2001) N2039 and John Jaminan v The State (No 2) [1983] PNGLR 318 referred to

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Kandakasi J: You pleaded no guilty to one charge of armed gang robbery on 3 August 2000, at East Boroko, National Capital District where cash and goods totaling K9,600.00 was stolen. This necessitated a trial, mainly on the issued of identification as the other important aspects of the charge were not in issue.

In a bid to establish the charge against you, the State called 4 witnesses namely, Alex Theo, Baia Abubu, Sioni Papi and Milton Kelemandi. It also had admitted into evidence the following documents with your consent:

1. Statement of Ngu Kei Dung dated 11 September 2000—Exhibit "A";

2. Statement of Milton Kelemandi undated—Exhibit "B"; and

3. Statement of Dominic Sumala dated 3 August 2000—Exhibit "C"

Undisputed facts and findings of fact

From these witnesses and the statements, the undisputed facts, which I so find as facts are these. On 3 August 2000, between 10.00am and 11.00am an armed gang robbery took place at Section 6, Allotment 7, Bisini Parade, East Boroko, National Capital District. Four men, two in police uniform and two in civilian cloths drove up to the gate of a house with a company office downstairs at the above place. One of the two in civilian was the driver of the vehicle described as a Toyota Hilux, Surf, white in colour and bearing registration number BBD 519. The driver stopped the vehicle at gate. Witness Abaia Abubu, who was then employed as a security, asked the driver, what were they looking for. Then the person sitting in the crew seat, who was in police uniform, said they were looking for...