Abubaker Kalungi (R) was acquitted

The High court has acquitted Abubaker Kalungi for the double murder of former Buyende district police commander Muhammad Kirumira and his friend Resty Nalinya Mbabazi.
 
Kirumira’s vehicle was sprayed with a volley of bullets on the evening of September 8, 2018. Kalungi was arrested a few days later from Buliisa district. Kirumira had earlier told the media that he expected death anytime because his police bosses were after him since he had exposed their corrupt dealings and abuse of the police uniform before President Yoweri Museveni. He also said he’d been blocked from meeting the president to avail him with more incriminating evidence against senior police and army officers.
 
In court, the state alleged that Kalungi was hired by Hamza Mwebe and Abdu Kateregga to trail Kirumira and inform them of his whereabouts. It was alleged that on a fateful day, Kalungi informed Mwebe and Kateregga where Kirumira was, and the two came riding on motorcycles before shooting him dead.
 
In December 2022, court acquitted Mwebe while Kateregga was killed by security agents, leaving Kalungi as the lone suspect in the case. However, Kalungi denied killing the duo and said that on the day of the murders, he was roofing a house in Ndejje, Kibutika before retiring to his home after work. His wife, Halima Naggita corroborated his statement before the court.
 
The judge noted that the prosecution was able to demonstrate three of the four ingredients of murder, which are that there was death, it was unlawful, and that there was malice aforethought. However, the prosecution failed to prove the fourth ingredient of participation, where it had to prove beyond reasonable doubt that the accused person had directly participated in the murders by placing him at the scene of the crime or indirectly facilitating the matter.
Justice Margaret Mutonyi dismissed the charge and caution statement that the prosecution presented, indicating that Kalungi had confessed to participating in the murders. She said the court couldn’t rely on the statement as it was written in good English, and the accused person spoke and understood Luganda.

There was no proof that the statement written in English had been read to him and that he understood it before he allegedly appended his signature. The judge further noted that Kalungi’s name, as written on the statement, appeared as though it was written by a child, an indication that the accused couldn’t read or write.

Furthermore, the court found that the accused had been tortured to accept the statement. Earlier, Kalungi informed court that he had been tortured and made to sign against his will several documents. A doctor’s statement upon examination of Kalungi also revealed that Kalungi had healing bruises on his forehead and back, which could have been sustained less than a week ago. 

 
The doctor’s examination was conducted four days after Kalungi entered the said charge and caution statement. This showed that the suspect could have been tortured prior to executing the statement, and yet detective Stephen Walimbwa who administered it told the court that at the time of administering the statement, the suspect was in good shape.

The judge wondered how the officer couldn’t have seen the wounds on the suspect’s forehead, yet the doctor saw the same four days later. The court session was attended by the family of Kalungi and that of the late Kirumira. Two females from Kalungi’s family got teary eyes when he was acquitted. Both sides silently exited the courtroom after the judgment. Kalungi was handcuffed, and his lawyer, Zefania Zimbe, said that prisons would soon embark on processing him out upon acquittal.

 

Source: The Observer

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