Kiyongo George v Uganda [1998] UGSC 12

Supreme Court · 1998 Appeal Dismissed ✦ AI-generated summary ↓ Download

Jurisdiction

Uganda

Case Type

Second criminal appeal from the Court of Appeal's dismissal of an appeal against a High Court murder conviction

Decision

Appeal dismissed; murder conviction and death sentence confirmed

The full judgment

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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 Supreme Court dismissed the appellant's second appeal against his murder conviction. The defence of intoxication had been abandoned in the Court of Appeal, and counsel's theories of insanity, drug-induced temporary insanity, and intoxication negating intent were unsupported by evidence. An accused who raises insanity or intoxication bears the evidential burden of adducing facts to bring his case within those defences; the appellant adduced no such evidence and could not even name the drug allegedly taken. The trial court had properly considered and rejected insanity and intoxication. The prosecution had proved beyond reasonable doubt that the appellant was of sound mind when he committed the murder, so the conviction was correctly upheld.

Facts

The appellant lived at Kasenyi landing site as a neighbour of Aisa Namusoke (P.W.1), mother of the deceased, Falida Najjuko, whom he had earlier threatened to beat. On the evening of 1 December 1992 the appellant announced that he was running mad and asked to be tied to his bed. Neighbours, including the R.C.1 Secretary for Security, gathered and tied his hands and legs to the bed with gauze wire, then dispersed. After confirming with his wife that the people had left, the appellant freed himself, armed himself with a hoe, and went to P.W.1's kitchen where the deceased was hiding. He pulled her out and struck her on the head three times with the hoe, rendering her unconscious, then told P.W.1 to collect her dead body. The deceased was taken to Entebbe hospital, where doctors found her brain damaged, and she died early the next morning. At trial the appellant claimed he had taken unnamed medicine and was asleep, and denied knowing how the deceased died.

Issues

Whether the defence of intoxication was available to the appellant such as to negate the intent to commit murder.
Whether the Court of Appeal erred in casting the onus of proving the defence of intoxication upon the appellant.
Whether the defences of insanity or temporary insanity arising from a drug were made out on the evidence.

Orders

Appeal dismissed.
Conviction and sentence confirmed.

Key headnotes

Criminal Law — Defences — Insanity and Intoxication — Evidential Burden on the Accused

An accused who seeks to rely on insanity or intoxication bears the burden of adducing evidence sufficient to bring his case within the defence; in the absence of such evidence the defence cannot succeed and the court is not obliged to act on counsel's unsupported theories.

Criminal Law — Defence of Intoxication — Negation of Specific Intent — Proof of Drug Taken

A claim that intoxication rendered the accused incapable of forming the intent to kill must be founded on evidence; where the accused fails even to disclose the name of the drug allegedly taken, no amount of speculation can support the defence.

Criminal Procedure — Appeals — Ground Abandoned in the Court Below

A ground of appeal concerning a defence that was abandoned in the Court of Appeal cannot properly be resurrected before the Supreme Court on a further appeal.

Legislation cited (2)

Penal Code Act s.183
Trial on Indictments Decree 1971 s.64

Cases cited (1)

Cheminingwa v R (1956) 23 EACA 451

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.