By: G Bennie Bravo Johnson I
Monrovia City Court Judge Ben Barco has sent a 38-year-old man identified as Mohammed Fofana, alias “Laye,” to prison for allegedly killing his eight-month-old pregnant girlfriend, Aminata Talawally, in the Gardnerville area.
Magistrate Barco’s decision on May 29, 2023, came after the Liberia National Police forwarded defendant Fofana to court to be prosecuted for the crime of murder.
According to police, defendant Fofana was arrested and acquainted with his Miranda rights after it was established that he assaulted his pregnant girlfriend, who was later pronounced dead on arrival by a doctor identified as Kargbo on May 17, 2023.
He was investigated and subsequently charged with murder, a first-degree felony under the laws of Liberia, which is also a non-bailable offense.
It was established during the police preliminary investigation that defendant Fofana and the late Talawally were in a relationship (boyfriend and girlfriend) for more than three years but lived at separate locations.
The police investigation revealed that it all started on May 17, 2023, between the hours of 4-5 am, when an altercation ensued between the defendant and the victim in her home in the NTA community, which degenerated into a fistfight between both of them.
The defendant beat on the victim and left her unconscious on the grounds that she insulted his mother.
He abandoned the deceased after she went unconscious and returned three hours later, before he called community members, according to the police charge sheet.
“The community members, having observed that the victim’s condition has been unresponsive, decided to have the police of Gardnerville, Zone Four (4) Station, informed.”
When apprehended and subsequently investigated, defendant Fofana admitted to his involvement after denying it on several occasions but changed his story, for which he was later charged with the crime of murder, an act that violates Chapter 14, Section 14.1 of the revised penal law of Liberia.
However, in an exclusive interview with the defendant, he disclosed that he killed the victim out of jealousy.
According to defendant Fofana, he rented a room for the victim, and a man only identified as a Marine usually called to inform him that another man visited his girlfriend very often while he was away.
He revealed that on the day of the incident, it was the same man who called and told him that there was another man with his girlfriend, which agitated him and forced him to immediately go home.
He narrated that upon reaching home, he met another man in a fight with his wife, and while trying to intervene, his hand hit the deceased on the neck, which caused her death.
But the LNP’s investigative report revealed that there were several bruises on the body of the deceased.
Defendant Fofana, however, confessed to this interview that he killed his eight-month-old pregnant woman, abandoned her lifeless body in the room, and waited for dawn to take her to the hospital.
Fofana has been charged with the commission of murder pending a court trial.
