The Capitol Building arson trial took a dramatic turn on Wednesday, December 11, 2025, when prosecution primary witness Rafael Wilson admitted that one of the defendants on trial John Nyanti had been returned to Liberia to testify for the state, a strategy that ultimately collapsed during cross-examination.
Wilson’s testimony revealed significant gaps in the government’s handling of Nyanti’s arrest, detention, and alleged cooperation, raising new questions about the integrity of the investigation.
Wilson, while on the witness stand disclosed that defendant defendant Nyanti had been extradited from Ghana with the intention of serving as a state witness, an arrangement he said later fell apart.
Testifying before Criminal Court ‘A’ Judge Roosevelt Z. Willie and the fifteen panel jury, Wilson explained that Nyanti was arrested in Ghana with assistance from Ghanaian police and flown back to Liberia under an understanding that he would help prosecutors.
He testified that authorities initially accommodated Nyanti at a hotel along the Roberts International Airport (RIA) highway to restrict outside contact while discussions over his cooperation were underway.
During an intense cross-examination, one of defense led counsels Cllr. Arthur T. Johnson pressed Wilson on core elements of the investigation. Wilson conceded that he did not know whether Nyanti wrote or signed his own police statement, noting that the interrogation had been carried out by another officer who also signed the document.
He also admitted he was unsure whether he was present at the time the statement was taken.
Cllr. Johnson further challenged him on whether Nyanti’s constitutional rights, including access to a lawyer, communication with family, phone use, and the right to remain silent, had been properly upheld.
Although Wilson insisted that these rights were respected, he could not clearly confirm whether Nyanti had first been taken to the National Security Agency (NSA) before being handed over to police.
Tensions escalated outside the courtroom earlier that day when Nyanti, escorted in handcuffs into Criminal Court “A” on June 13, 2025, accused members of the Boakai administration of offering him US$200,000 to falsely implicate former House Speaker Jonathan Fonati Koffa.
“You say you have evidence, but you want to give me 200k to lie against Fonati Koffa,” Nyanti shouted as officers guided him inside.
He further asserted that he had been in Liberia since June 6 and claimed he was pressured by state actors to provide fabricated testimony.
Nyanti and other defendants were indicted by the Montserrado County Grand Jury on charges related to the December 18, 2024 fire that severely damaged the Legislature’s Joint Chambers.
Court proceedings are scheduled to resume on Thursday, December 11, 2025, as the defense intensifies its efforts to challenge the prosecution’s investigative process and the credibility of its witnesses.
