Since the acquittal of former Finance Minister Samuel D. Tweah and the conviction of Cllr. Nyanti Tuan and others in the US$6.2 million Economic Sabotage case, many legal experts have expressed diverse views over the jury’s mixed verdict, with some arguing that the case is over, while others are calling for a retrial.
Jeremiah Samuel Dugbo, a legal expert and adjunct faculty member in Criminal Evidence & Procedures at the AME University and a student of Constitutional Law, argued that the public celebration and legal conclusions following the recent jury verdict in the high-profile economic sabotage and corruption trial may be premature.
He added that while two of the five defendants, including the former Minister of Finance & Development Planning, obtained a verdict of not guilty from the jury, the legal controversy surrounding the matter may not necessarily end with the anticipated judgment expected within five days from the verdict.
“Many legal analysts, lawyers, lawmakers, and members of the public have confidently asserted that the acquitted defendants are beyond the reach of further judicial scrutiny because Chapter 24, Section 24.2(a) & (b) of Liberia’s Criminal Procedure Law appears to restrict the right of appeal in criminal cases solely to the defendant. On the face of the statute, this interpretation may appear sound. However, constitutional law does not end with statutory interpretation. Rather, statutes derive their legitimacy from the Constitution, and where inconsistency exists, the Constitution prevails,” he averred.
Quoting Article 20(b) of the Liberian Constitution, which guarantees the right to appeal and declares that right inviolable, Dugbo argued that, significantly, the constitutional provision does not expressly restrict the right of appeal to any particular party in criminal proceedings.
“The language employed by the Constitution is broad, unrestricted, and supreme. Therefore, the lingering constitutional question is whether the Legislature, through ordinary statute, may lawfully curtail or limit a right that the Constitution itself did not restrict.”
He said an equally important consideration is that the Criminal Procedure Law of Liberia was enacted in 1972, long before the adoption and coming into force of the 1986 Constitution of Liberia. “This chronological reality is constitutionally significant. The 1986 Constitution is the supreme and controlling law of the Republic, and any preexisting statute inconsistent with its provisions survives only to the extent of its consistency with the Constitution,” he furthered.
He argued that while Chapter 24, Section 24.2 of the Criminal Procedure Law may have been legally operative under the pre-1986 constitutional order, its continued validity under the current constitutional framework remains a legitimate question for judicial review, saying, “A statute enacted fourteen years prior to the present Constitution cannot supersede, restrict, or diminish rights subsequently guaranteed by the Constitution itself.”
Dugbo stated that this raises a serious constitutional controversy worthy of judicial determination, adding that the doctrine of constitutional supremacy and repugnancy is well established in Liberia. Chapter 1, Article 2 of the Constitution emphatically provides that any law, statute, treaty, custom, or regulation inconsistent with the Constitution shall, to the extent of the inconsistency, be declared null and void.
“Consequently, if Chapter 24, Section 24.2 of the Criminal Procedure Law is interpreted as absolutely barring the State from appealing a criminal judgment, despite the Constitution’s broader and unrestricted guarantee of appeal, then a legitimate argument exists that such statutory limitation may itself be constitutionally defective,” Dugbo, among other things, noted in his argument.
For his part, J. Jefferson Chesson argued that the state has no right to appeal a criminal acquittal under Liberian Law. He said the constitutional argument fails at its foundation.
Chesson noted that Atty. Dugbo’s argument that Article 20(b) of the Liberian Constitution grants the State a right to appeal a criminal acquittal because the provision does not expressly restrict the right of defendants is fundamentally flawed for three reasons.
“First, Article 20(b) is not self-executing. The Supreme Court held in Ricks v. Heirs of the Late King [2014] LRSC 16 that while the right to appeal is constitutional, the constitutional right to appeal, as many other fundamental rights, is not self-executing.” The Constitution explicitly commands: “The legislature shall prescribe rules and procedures for the easy, expeditious and inexpensive filing and hearing of an appeal.” The Legislature did precisely that.”
“Second, the Legislature prescribed those rules in Section 24.2 of the Criminal Procedure Law, which provides unambiguously that “an appeal may be taken by the defendant from a judgment of conviction” and “by the defendant from a judgment on a plea of guilty.” The statute does not provide for State appeal. The maxim expressio unius est exclusio alterius applies,” Chesson argued.
He said, thirdly, there is no inconsistency between Article 20(b) and Section 24.2, adding, “The Constitution establishes the existence of an appeal right generally; the Legislature determines its scope in specific contexts. Had the framers intended to grant the State a right to appeal criminal acquittals, they would have said so explicitly, as many modern constitutions do. They did not.”
Chesson noted that the argument that the 1972 Criminal Procedure Law is suspect because it predates the 1986 Constitution misunderstands constitutional continuity nothing that the 1986 Constitution did not repeal by implication every pre-existing statute. Article 2 voids laws only “to the extent of the inconsistency.” No inconsistency exists here.
Moreover, according to Chesson, Section 24.2 has been consistently applied for over fifty years. In Bestman v. Republic [2013] LRSC 5, the Supreme Court reviewed a criminal appeal brought solely by the defendant; the State did not claim, and the Court did not recognize, any parallel right of the State to appeal. This longstanding practice carries decisive interpretive weight.
He quoted Article 21(e) of the Constitution, which provides that, “No person shall be subject to double jeopardy for the same offense.” Once a jury returns a verdict of not guilty, jeopardy has attached and terminated. Permitting the State to appeal that acquittal would subject the defendant to a second prosecution for the same offense, precisely what double jeopardy prohibits.
“In Republic v. Gloria Musu Scott (2024), the Supreme Court acquitted the defendants and ordered immediate release. The State did not seek and could not have sought to appeal. That would have violated double jeopardy,” Chesson argued.
