Nyakaishiki and 3 Others v Uganda (Criminal Appeal No. 0199 of 2015)

Court of Appeal · [2024] UGCA 355 · 2024 Appeal Partly Allowed ✦ AI-generated summary ↓ Download

Jurisdiction

Uganda

Case Type

Criminal appeal from High Court conviction and sentence for murder

Decision

Convictions for murder upheld; sentence of 45 years set aside and each appellant re-sentenced to 35 years' imprisonment (40 years less 5 years' remand).

The full judgment

Read the complete, verbatim text of this judgment.

Cited — treatment unverified cited in 2 (treatment unverified) Derived from citing cases in the Wakilii corpus — not an assertion that this case is good law.

AI-generated summary. This summary was generated by AI from the full text of the judgment. It may contain errors or omissions — always read the source judgment before relying on it.

Holding

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal against conviction. It held that the retracted and repudiated charge and caution statements of the first, second and third appellants were voluntarily made, were mutually corroborative, and could be taken into consideration against the makers and the fourth co-accused under section 27 of the Evidence Act, establishing joint participation in the murder. The appeal against sentence was allowed: the trial court had not clearly demonstrated that the remand period was deducted and had considered aggravating factors in isolation of mitigating factors. On re-sentencing, the court imposed 40 years' imprisonment, deducted the 5 years spent on remand, and sentenced each appellant to 35 years from the date of conviction.

Facts

In the early hours of 8 June 2010, two assailants entered the home where the deceased, his wife (the first appellant) and a housemaid were asleep. They tied up the wife and housemaid, demanded money from the deceased, then killed him; his neck was injured, his forearm cut and his genitals severed. The housemaid raised the alarm at dawn. Although the first appellant claimed the assailants had forced the door with a big stone, police found no signs of forcible entry and the door bolts were intact. The deceased's son (the second appellant) went into hiding, was pursued and arrested, admitted the offence and implicated the others. Charge and caution statements of the first, second and third appellants, recorded after a trial within a trial finding them voluntary, gave corroborative accounts of a plan hatched over family property to hire assailants to kill the deceased, including the cutting of the genitals for rituals. The fourth appellant was implicated by the third appellant's statement.

Issues

Whether the trial Judge erred in convicting the appellants while relying on their retracted and repudiated confessions.
Whether the conviction was unsafe for being based on hearsay, inconsistencies and an absence of proof of common intention to murder in the absence of an eyewitness.
Whether the sentence of 45 years' imprisonment was harsh and excessive, and whether the period spent on remand was deducted as required by Article 23(8) of the Constitution.

Orders

The appeal against conviction is dismissed.
The appeal against sentence is allowed.
A sentence of 40 years' imprisonment is imposed on each appellant; the 5 years spent on remand are deducted, and each appellant is sentenced to 35 years' imprisonment to be served from the date of conviction (08.06.15).

Key headnotes

Evidence — Confessions — Retracted and Repudiated Confessions — Corroboration

As a matter of practice or prudence a trial court should warn itself that it is dangerous to act on a retracted or repudiated confession in the absence of corroboration in some material particular, but it may convict on such a confession where it is fully satisfied in the circumstances that the confession is true.

Evidence — Confessions — Voluntariness — Trial Within a Trial

Before admitting in evidence a confession that has not been admitted by its maker, the trial court must hold a trial within a trial and be satisfied that the confession was voluntarily made by the accused.

Evidence — Confessions — Confession of Co-Accused — Evidence Act s.27

Where, on a trial of more than one person for the same offence, a confession is made by one of them affecting himself and others, the court may take that confession into consideration against the maker and against the other accused implicated by it.

Criminal Law & Procedure — Sentencing — Remand Period — Article 23(8) of the Constitution

A sentencing court must take the period spent on remand into account by way of arithmetical deduction; however, where the court has clearly demonstrated that it credited the remand period, the sentence will not be interfered with merely because different words were used or an express deduction was not stated.

Criminal Law & Procedure — Sentencing — Mitigating and Aggravating Factors

A sentence may be set aside on appeal where the trial court considered the aggravating factors in isolation and failed to consider the mitigating factors of the case.

Legislation cited (7)

Penal Code Act s.188
Penal Code Act s.189
Evidence Act s.27
Judicature Act s.11
Constitution of the Republic of Uganda 1995 art.23(8)
Rules of the Court of Appeal Rule 30(1)(a)
Constitution (Sentencing Guidelines for Courts of Judicature) Practice Directions, 2013 (Legal Notice No.8 of 2013) Sentencing Principle No.6(c)

Cases cited (8)

Pandya v R [1957] EA 336
Kifamunte Henry v Uganda (Supreme Court Criminal Appeal No. 10 of 1997)
Tuwamoi v Uganda [1967] EA 84
Rwabugande Moses v Uganda (Criminal Appeal No. 25 of 2014)
Abelle Asuman v Uganda (Supreme Court Criminal Appeal No. 66 of 2016)
Aharikundira Yustina v Uganda (Supreme Court Criminal Appeal No. 27 of 2015)
Bakubuye Muzamiru & Another v Uganda (Criminal Appeal No. 56 of 2015)
Florence Abbo v Uganda (Criminal Appeal No. 168 of 2013)

Source: this page presents Wakilii’s issue analysis and metadata for a publicly reported Ugandan judgment. Any AI-generated summary is marked as such. Judgment text is sourced from the Uganda Legal Information Institute (ulii.org). Wakilii is not affiliated with ULII.