Nayele Ametefe. INSET: The seized assets
Assets of jailed drug baron, Nayele Ametefe, also known as Ruby Adu-Gyamfi, have been confiscated in accordance with an Accra High Court order.
Officials of the Narcotics Control Board (NACOB) carted furniture and furnishings from Nayele’s business enterprise, Night Angels Enterprise, located at the Dzorwulu Motorway Extension in Accra.
The colourful furniture have been presented to three rehabilitation centres – Darferick at Medie House of St. Francis, Ashaiman and the Addictive Diseases Unit of the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital, where drug abuse patients are receiving treatment.
NACOB Deputy Executive Secretary Michael Addo stressed NACOB’s commitment to fighting narcotic crimes and punishing those who have made wealth through the illegal trade.
“We have been seizing houses, we have been seizing vehicles,” he said.
Nayele Ametefe is currently serving an eight years, eight months jail term in the United Kingdom (U.K).
Nayele was arrested on November 10, 2014 at the Heathrow Airport in the United Kingdom by officers of the UK Border Force with 12.5 kg of cocaine worth $5million in her hand luggage.
The 33-year-old pleaded guilty to charges of transporting cocaine to the United Kingdom and was sentenced on her own plea by the Isleworth Crown Court in London in January 2015.
The mother of the convict, Akua Adubofo, is in court challenging the attempt to confiscate the East Legon house Ruby lived in before her arrest in London as well as the one in her hometown, Pease.
NACOB and the Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO) filed an application on December 3, 2015 asking the court to grant an order for them to confiscate Ruby’s properties.
The properties included two houses, one at East Legon in Accra and one at Pease in the Ashanti Region, an electrical shop known as Night Angels Enterprise, located at Dzorwulu, and six Fidelity Bank accounts with total cash of approximately GH¢23,000.
The court, in a ruling on April 6, 2016 granted the applications and ordered the confiscation of the electrical shop and the six bank accounts, stating that the properties were derived from the proceeds of a crime.
The confiscation order, however, did not include two houses in dispute due to a suit by Nayele’s mother.
The houses are currently the subject of a legal battle between the mother of convicted drug peddler and the state.
Nayele’s mother, Ms Adubofo, claims the houses, located at East Legon in Accra, and Pease in the Ashanti Region, belong to her and not the daughter.