Mob justice is when a person suspected to be a criminal is beaten by a group of people or crowd with clubs, stones, machetes, or anything they can lay their hands on. In some cases the alleged criminal dies in the process due to excessive beating or they are set on fire using old car tires and fuel.[1] Mob justice, also known as ‘instant justice’ or ‘jungle justice’, occurs in various towns and cities in Ghana. According to the laws of Ghana, this act is illegal and intolerable, but it occurs at an increasing rate. People who engage in this act are usually onlookers or people passing by or an organized group also known as "community vigilantes" whose aim is to protect the community from criminals.[citation needed]
In Ghana, it is not only alleged criminals that sometimes face mob justice; people suspected to be witches, wizards, adulterers and homosexuals sometimes find themselves in such situations. Due to the lack of trust in the law enforcement system in Ghana people resort to taking the law into their own hands and deal with these alleged criminals their own way.
From various research and surveys, people attributed the action of mob justice to;
In the journal Implication of mob justice practice among communities in Ghana a survey conducted by Ernest Adu-Gyamfi on 1,000 people, including males and females, in the Kumasi Metropolis which is the capital city of the Ashanti Region, consist of 20 suburbs and people who are 18 years and above. 51% of the respondents in the survey have secondary education while 23.7% have tertiary education.[citation needed] In response to the causes of mob justice, 47.9% strongly agree that delay in justice is a major cause of the action in the metropolis, 45% agree and 4% disagree with that claim.[citation needed] With the aspect of prolonged police investigations as one of the causes of mob justice, 63.7% strongly agree and 30% agree.[citation needed] 81.2% of the respondents strongly agree that they are not satisfied with the sentences sometimes emitted to convicted criminals and 18.8% strongly disagree with the dissatisfaction level of criminal sentence.[citation needed] On the claim of the judicial and police service being corrupt and being the cause of mob justice, 44.4% strongly agree and 55.6% strongly disagree.[citation needed] Also, 79.5% strongly agree to mob justice serving as a deterrent to other criminals.[citation needed]
For the claim that people who are involved in the act of mob justice are ignorant and not aware that their actions are illegal and strip victims of fundamental human rights, 84.9% strongly disagree and 15.1% agree with this claim.[citation needed] With this assertion, perpetrators of this act are fully aware of the consequences of their actions but still engage in the act of mob justice.
Mob Justice is a criminal offence pursuant to Act 29 of the Criminal Code of 1960 which covers the various aspect of mob justice.
Also Chapter 5 of the constitution of Ghana protects the fundamental human rights and freedoms of a person.
Article 13 states that “No person shall be deprived of his life intentionally except in the exercise of the execution of a sentence of a court in respect of a criminal offence under the laws of Ghana of which he has been convicted”.[3]
Article 15 talks about "RESPECT FOR HUMAN DIGNITY" and that;
Article 19 requires FAIR TRIAL for;
All the above mentioned are legal provisions that protects suspected criminals from the act of mob justice or instant justice.