UGANDA: THREE SENTENCED TO 50 YEARS IN JAIL FOR MURDER OF ERITREAN NATIONAL

May 18, 2021:

The High Court in Kampala on 17 May 2021 sentenced three man to 50 years in Jail for the kidnap and killing of an Eritrean businessman.
Daniel Michael Weldu, a resident of Muyenga and owned businesses in Uganda and South Sudan was abducted from Kololo, a leafy Kampala suburb on 27 October 2016 and the body later found burnt at the Uganda-Kenya border in Busia.
UPDF Captain Bumali Mangeni was convicted together with two civilians including Benon Duncan Lumu and Andrew Kisitu.
On 17 May afternoon, Justine Flavia Anglin Senoga said the three convicts deserved a sentence that would ensure the trio serves as an example to other would be offenders.
The Judge noted that the convicts deserved to be sentenced to death but the death sentence no longer exists in the Laws of Uganda and found the 50 years to be enough.
“The commission of the offences was meticulously premeditated and executed. All the convicts acted in furtherance of an unlawful purpose and each one played a part in the commission of the offences as they failed to dissociate themselves from the heinous acts, “Justice Senoga said.
The judge said the trio carried out the mission immaculately that they were able to kidnap the Eritrean businessman from Kololo, forced him to withdraw money from his bank account that they stole and later killed him, before burning the body kill evidence.
“The deceased was kidnapped, threatened to be charged with made up offences, sedated into unconsciousness, robbed and was eventually murdered for the sole purpose of stealing money that he had on his accounts. The kidnap was as a result of fraud and his death was not accidental but deliberately occasioned in furtherance of unlawful purpose.”
“The body of the deceased was set ablaze with an apparent intention of causing disguise about the cause of death and to hide the identity of the deceased.”
The judge consequently sentenced each of the three convicts to 50 years imprisonment for kidnap with intent to murder, 30 years for aggravated robbery and 50 years for murder of the businessman.
She also ordered that they pay shs200 million to the deceased’s family in compensation but also refund the money they robbed from the deceased.
“The sentences to run concurrently and the period spent on remand should be deducted,” she said.