A US immigration judge, David Gardey, has questioned the strength of the corruption case against former Minister of Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta, saying allegations filed by the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) lacked credible evidence of criminal wrongdoing.<\/p>\n
In explaining his decision to approve Mr. Ofori-Atta\u2019s permanent residency application, the US Immigration Judge said the OSP\u2019s affidavit was \u201cfull of conclusory allegations\u201d and did not provide \u201ccredible or reliable facts\u201d showing that the former minister engaged in criminal conduct.<\/p>\n
The judge\u2019s comments, contained in his June 15, 2026 ruling, provide the court\u2019s reasoning for why it found Mr. Ofori-Atta deserving of immigration relief despite the corruption-related charges brought against him in Ghana.<\/p>\n
Judge Gardey said he had reviewed the OSP\u2019s case, which includes more than 70 criminal counts against Mr. Ofori-Atta, but found the evidence presented did not persuasively demonstrate that he committed wrongdoing as Finance Minister or personally benefited from his public position.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe lack of any persuasive evidence indicating any kind of criminal wrongdoing or criminal conspiracy involving the respondent in the OSP\u2019s affidavit is powerful evidence,\u201d the judge said.<\/p>\n
The court said that while the allegations from Ghana described serious claims of corruption, including accusations of conspiracy and misuse of public funds, the OSP had not provided sufficient evidence to support those claims.<\/p>\n
Instead, the judge said Mr. Ofori-Atta had testified credibly and denied receiving anything of value from companies or individuals involved in the investigations, or benefiting personally from decisions he made while serving as a government official.<\/p>\n
The judge\u2019s assessment was part of a broader evaluation of whether Mr. Ofori-Atta\u2019s positive circumstances outweighed immigration concerns, including his overstay of a US visa.<\/p>\n
In reaching his decision, the court considered Mr. Ofori-Atta\u2019s long-standing ties to the United States, including his education and professional career there, his US citizen son, his lack of a criminal record in the country, and his medical treatment in the United States.<\/p>\n
The judge also cited the removal of an Interpol Red Notice linked to Ghana\u2019s charges, a review by KPMG that found administrative weaknesses but no criminal wrongdoing by Mr. Ofori-Atta or his staff, and the fact that the US Department of Justice had not pursued an extradition case based on Ghana\u2019s request.<\/p>\n
Judge Gardey said those factors supported his conclusion that the allegations against Mr. Ofori-Atta were not credible enough to outweigh the positive factors in his immigration case.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A US immigration judge, David Gardey, has questioned the strength of the corruption case against former Minister of Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta, saying allegations filed by the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) lacked credible evidence of criminal wrongdoing. In explaining his decision to approve Mr. Ofori-Atta\u2019s permanent residency application, the US Immigration Judge said the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":123457,"featured_media":17170,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4217,41,3718],"tags":[5399,1098,2031],"class_list":["post-17169","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-accountability","category-general-news","category-legal","tag-david-gardey","tag-ken-ofori-atta","tag-osp-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17169","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/123457"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17169"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17169\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17171,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17169\/revisions\/17171"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/17170"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17169"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17169"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17169"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}