By Yankuba Jallow
Police Chief Superintendent Bakeba Suso has on Monday testified before the High Court as a prosecution witness in the murder trial of seven NIA agents charged with the murder of Solo Sandeng.
Suso is the 33rd prosecution witness (PW33) in the ongoing criminal trial of former intelligence chiefs who are facing 25 criminal counts ranging from conspiracy to commit a felony, assault causing serious bodily harm, murder and making false documents, among others.
He said he joined the Gambia Police Force (GPF) on the 5th May 1996. He pointed out that he is the officer in charge of criminal intelligence at the Police Headquarters.
“I was responsible for criminal investigation in 2017,” he said.
In his testimony, Suso said sometime in the year 2017, he was tasked by Deputy Commissioner Buba Sarr, who was the Crime Management Coordinator (CMC) to constitute a panel. He testified that the panel was set up to interview agents of the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) in relation to the demise of Solo Sandeng.
He said the panel consisted of; Assistant Commissioner Pateh Bah (now Deputy Commissioner) as the head of the panel, Chief Superintendent Fakeba Darboe and Superintendent Thomas S. Gomez as senior officers. He said there were junior soldiers such as Sergeant, Inspector and Constables in the investigative team.
He told the court that he was tasked to record the interview proceedings of the NIA agents. He explained that at the beginning of the interview, he used a small micro recorder which was later substituted with a digital recorder.
“The recordings of the digital recorder were kept in a CDR and later into an external hard drive,” the witness said.
At this juncture, the matter was adjourned to Tuesday for the continuation of examination of PW33 and for further hearing. The matter will reconvene at 1 pm.
