May 24, 2023 [Finland] Day 55: Safe house security examined
Witness H3’s police interview recording is played
As H3 was unable to appear in court and the court decided that his witness testimony could be received by watching the recording of his police interview. The recording was played in court.
H3 was asked about his tasks and assignments in 2003. He testified that in 2003, he worked as an armed police officer in Sierra Leone. From 22 May 2003, he was working in witness protection at the request of the Special Court for Sierra Leone. When he began this role, witnesses were being brought from different districts by the Witness Protection Team. His task was to protect witnesses that were placed in safe houses. He worked in the safe houses, in the office and he sometimes travelled to other districts to bring more witnesses to Freetown. In 2003, he was working at a safe house on Pipeline. The witness living in that safe house was Gibril Massaquoi, he lived there with his wife, children and brother. This was the first safe house H3 worked at and it was the first safe house that Gibril Massaquoi stayed in. H3 could not recall exactly when he was brought into the safe house. They had logbooks that they used at the time. He was not sure whether these logbooks had been archived or whether they could be accessed.
When the witness began working for the Special Court, it took a few weeks before any witnesses were brought. Gibril was the first witness. This was the first time the witness had met Gibril Massaquoi, he had heard his name on the radio before but had never met him. He was brought a few weeks after 22 May 2003. When H3 went to the safe house for the first time, Gibril Massaquoi was there. He started working at the safe house the same day he was brought there. Gibril Massaquoi was there with his family, but Michael Bona came later. H3 estimated that Gibril spent about a year in the first safe house. He had heard of an attack in Kington, in Bomi, Freetown. He was not on duty when the incident occurred. He could not remember the date, but it had been mentioned in some documents. He learned about the attack when he came to the office.
H3 explained the security arrangements at Pipeline. The guards were split into two shifts, A and B. There were one or two guards per shift. The safe house had a fence and some of the guards were armed. There was security 24/7. The guards had the key to the gate because the witnesses were not allowed to leave the house freely, even for meetings at the Special Court office. The safe house on Pipeline had one main gate and one exit gate, but only the main gate could be used. The witness could not have used the exit gate as they would not be authorized by the guards to do so. The guards had a room inside the house, but they mostly sat outside by the gate. The guards saw the witness every day. They would stay on duty until the next shift came to relieve them. The guard coming to the next shift had to see the witness before changing shifts.
The witness could not remember any time that Gibril stayed out of the safe house on Pipeline for a long period of time. He listed some of the other guards working at Pipeline, including Defense 08 and H6. There were no other members of staff, Gibril’s wife was cooking. Someone was sent to buy groceries so that they could cook at the house. He could not recall who did the shopping but speculated that it was Gibril’s wife. He then stated that there were some women working in Witness Protection who may have done it, including a lady who is now in Holland whose name he had forgotten. He speculated that GM’s wife went outside to buy groceries. Neither Gibril Massaquoi nor Michael Bona went outside. Every time the guards changed shifts, they would see the witness and note their shift in the logbook before commencing their duties.
H3 was not involved in escorting Gibril outside the safe house. Other security guards from the office took care of these duties. The longest time Gibril was away from the safe house was two to three hours. His return was always noted in the logbook, he had a code name so that he could not be identified. H3 testified that Gibril never spent the night outside the safe house.
After Pipeline, Gibril Massaquoi was taken to Jomo Kenyatta Road, Freetown. He stayed there for almost a year as well. From there, he was taken to Kington, where the attack happened. After Kington, he moved to the Light, around the Brookfields area. H3 could not remember the street Gibril Massaquoi lived on in Light. H3 worked in all of these safe houses. The one in Light was the last one. After Gibril Massaquoi was relocated, H3 had not seen him. They had not called each other either.
Witness H6 is heard
H6 was heard via video link from the United Kingdom.
The defense questions H6
The defense began by asking H6 where he had gotten to know Gibril Massaquoi. H6 testified that they met in Sierra Leone, when he was working for the Special Court for Sierra Leone. They met in March 2003 on 7B Pipeline, off Wilkinson Road. It was one of the Special Court’s safe houses, the witness was working there as a security guard for the Witness Protection Unit. He began working there in March 2003 and worked with Gibril Massaquoi until early 2005. The safe house in Pipeline was the first one Gibril Massaquoi lived in. He lived there with his family, whose names the witness listed. Massaquoi lived in the Pipeline safe house until 2004, when the family moved to Jomo Kenyatta Road. They did not live there for a long time, H6 estimated that they moved again at the end of 2004.
H6 gave the names and code names of the other guards working at the Pipeline safehouse, including Defense 08 and a woman who did not work as a security guard but came to visit the house occasionally. He also provided his own code name. The witness was working at the safe house with his wife when Massaquoi arrived there. His wife, H4, worked as a cook at the safe house. The witness gave the names of the three other guards working at the safe house when Massaquoi arrived, including Defense 08. H6’s task was to guard the safe house during the day. He would make sure that Gibril Massaquoi and his family did not leave the house and that nobody came inside. He would patrol and walk around the area. The guards had a logbook that was used to note down shift changes and anything that happened at the house. The witness testified that he worked at the safe house seven days a week from March till September 2003. He did not have days off and did not take any sick leave or other time off. His shift was from 7 am to 7 pm. He usually saw Gibril Massaquoi during his shift, he could hear the family upstairs playing games or listening to the radio.
The witness testified that when he was not patrolling the property, he was downstairs inside the house, facing the gate. When the guards changed shifts, they would inspect the house, the family and Gibril Massaquoi before handing the shift over to the next guard. The logbook was used to log daily activities, such as the beginning and end of patrols and the change of the guards. Gibril Massaquoi left the safe house in 2003, to go to a doctor’s appointment or to the office of the Special Court. He always had security with him, he never left the house alone. The guards at the house were contacted via phone or radio before a vehicle was sent to pick him up. H6 could not say exactly how long the trips outside the safe house took, it depended on the appointment. He was never gone for a whole day.
Massaquoi was paid an allowance while he was living at the safe house. In 2005, H6 had stopped working at the safe houses and went to work at the main office, where he handled the allowance payments. The guards had to make sure that Gibril Massaquoi personally signed for the money, his family members could not receive the money themselves. Massaquoi received the allowance every Friday.
H6 was aware of the attack on Gibril Massaquoi’s safe house. It occurred in Kington. The witness was not present at the safe house at the time, but he had heard about it at the office. He estimated that the attack took place in 2005. He testified that H4 did not work at the safe house for as long as he did. She was pregnant at the time, she came for a few months and left. Later, she worked as a cook at Brookfields Hotel. The last time the witness saw Massaquoi face to face was in 2005. They had spoken after that, in 2022, the witness had congratulated him for winning his case.
The prosecution questions H6
The prosecution began by asking H6 about the start date of his employment at the Pipeline safe house. The witness testified that he could not forget the start date of his employment. He began working in March 2003, he did not know why the Special Court had written 16 April 2003 on his work contract. H4 began working around the same time as H6. They both began at the safe house in Pipeline. They were both at the safe house when Massaquoi and his family were brought in. H4 was asked to clean the house and H6 helped her with it. H6 could not remember being assigned anywhere else before starting at the safe house in Pipeline. He worked there the whole time Gibril Massaquoi lived at the house, with no days off. H6 could not remember when H4 stopped working at the safe house, she was pregnant and left when she gave birth. Their child was born on 24 October 2003.
H6 testified that there were in total three guards at the safe house when Massaquoi arrived. The witness was there during the day and another shift would come for the night. This arrangement lasted two to three months before they had more guards came in. Massaquoi’s family members did not go outside without the guards accompanying them. The children did not go to school. The family had no visitors. This was the case for the whole time he worked there until 2005. H6 recalled Massaquoi complaining about not being able to leave the safe house, he wanted to go to the beach. He was not sure whether he was taken to the beach, but he had opened the gate and Massaquoi was taken somewhere. He could not remember when the allowance payments began.
H6 worked in other safe houses after he left the one Gibril Massaquoi was living in. Between 2003 and early 2005, he worked only at Gibril Massaquoi’s safe house. H6 did not know Y9. He knew H3, he came to work at the safe house later, similarly to Z3 and others, around 2004 or 2005. H3 did not work at Massaquoi’s safe house on Pipeline at the same time as H6. The witness knew [REDACTED], he worked at the Pipeline, Jomo Kenyatta Road and Kington safe houses. He had heard that he had lost his weapon during a shift, he had gone out drinking with his friends and lost it. This did not happen within the safe house premises, but outside.
The witness called Massaquoi in 2022 to congratulate him. He testified that Massaquoi was in the Special Court’s witness protection program between 2003 and 2005 and if anyone says he did anything during that time, they are lying. The witness and Massaquoi were not in regular contact between 2005 and 2022, but they spoke often. He did not know whether Massaquoi had been in contact with H4, but she had told him that she had also congratulated him for winning his case. H4 told him that all power comes from Christ and that he should tell the truth about the safe house.
According to H6, the safe house in Pipeline had only door at the front. It was surrounded by a tall fence with barbed wire on top. It only had one gate as an entrance. He could not remember any other gates or exits.
Questions from the court
The witness confirmed that originally, there were two to three guards at the safe house. He was alone during the day and there was another guard on night shift, he was armed. H6 was not armed on duty. There were two guards during the day from the beginning.
