IPNEWS: PUL Working to Secure Release of Two Journalists from Detention in Margibi County
(February 12, 2025): The Press Union of Liberia (PUL) is doing all it can to secure the release from further detention of two Liberian journalists based in Kakata, Margibi County.
Journalists Elvis Gono of the Liberia Broadcasting System (LBS) and Philip Gbana of Classic FM were detained on Monday, 10 February 2025, on the charge of “Contempt of Court.”
The newly assigned Judge of the 13th Judicial Circuit Court, Golda A. Bona Elliot, had ordered their detention for failing to produce the living body of a woman they had stood for as guarantors.
The woman in question was arrested and taken to Court in September 2024 on allegation of damaging the windshield of a vehicle, in a case linked to the murder of one person.
However, she needed guarantors at the time to secure her release because she was pregnant and sick as her case was pending assignment for the November Term of Court.
Both journalists Gono and Gbana – who also serves as Public Relations Officer at the Kakata City Corporation, committed to serving as guarantors and agreed to return the woman once requested by the Court.
Because of their reported failure to produce the woman in Court, despite being reportedly contacted by the Court, they are said not to have complied, according to Margibi County Attorney Deddeh Wilson, who spoke to the PUL.
The journalists denied ever being contacted by the Court.
On Wednesday, 12 February 2025, the woman in question, who is now a breastfeeding mother, was produced in Court by her family.
She was subsequently remanded at the Kakata Central Prison, where journalists Gono and Gbana are also being held. The breast-sucking baby of the woman was handed to her grandmother.
The PUL is working to ensure all the necessary legal paper works are completed to have the journalists released from further detention so that they can return to their families and duties.
The PUL expresses its thanks and appreciation to Judge Golda A. Bona Elliot and her staff at the 13th Judicial Circuit Court and the Assistant Minister for Corrections and Rehabilitation at the Ministry of Justice, Atty. Gabriel Ndupellar, for the courtesy accorded the PUL in the all-day long efforts to have the journalists released.
The PUL will provide further updates as soon as journalists Gono freedom.
