Naveed Ahmed v Uganda (Criminal Appeal No.129 of 2015)

Observed later treatment

Citator coverage is limited to judgments in the Wakilii corpus and source-matched treatment records. Absence of a signal is not an assertion that the case remains good law.

Holding

The Court of Appeal dismissed an application for leave to adduce additional evidence on a pending murder appeal. Applying the principles in Ladd v Marshall as expanded by the Supreme Court in Attorney General v Ssemogerere, the court held that none of the conditions were satisfied. The telephone print-outs and immigration records could have been obtained with reasonable diligence at trial, including while the applicant was in custody. The proposed evidence of the co-accused was not credible because he was a confessed liar who admitted on oath to having given false evidence at the High Court. A confessed liar cannot usually be accepted as credible absent good reason for the earlier lie.

Outcome

Application for leave to adduce additional evidence dismissed; criminal appeal to proceed on existing record

Facts

The applicant was convicted of murder and sentenced to death by the High Court on 22 February 2011, together with two co-accused. He filed a pending criminal appeal against conviction and sentence. By this application he sought leave to adduce additional evidence, comprising: testimony of a witness he claimed to have requested time to call at trial; testimony of a person allegedly hired to commit the killing; immigration records showing a co-actor left the country shortly after the murder; telephone print-outs; and evidence from a co-accused, Muzaffar Hussein, who swore an affidavit admitting he had given false evidence at trial and had framed the applicant. The applicant contended this evidence was unavailable while he was on remand. The respondent opposed the application as without merit. The court noted that the applicant in fact obtained the proposed evidence while in custody.

Issues

1. Whether the applicant satisfied the conditions for leave to adduce additional evidence on appeal.
2. Whether evidence from a co-accused who admits having lied at trial can be regarded as credible additional evidence.

Orders

• Application dismissed.

Rules and key headnotes

Legislation cited (3)

• Court of Appeal Rules r.30(1)(b)
• Court of Appeal Rules r.43(1)(b)
• Constitution of Uganda Article 126

Cases cited (6)

• Ladd v Marshall [1954] 1 WLR 1489
• General Parts (U) Ltd v Kunnal Pradip Karia (Civil Application No. 266 of 2013)
• Skone v Skone [1971] 1 WLR 817
• Mzee Wanje and others v Saikwa & others [1976-1985] 1 EA 364
• Attorney General v Paul K. Ssemogerere & others (Constitutional Application No. 2 of 2004)
• Kawoya v National Council for Higher Education (Miscellaneous Application No. 8 of 2013)

Cases citing this judgment (1)

How later Ugandan judgments in the Wakilii corpus have cited this case. Treatment labels come from Sequitur — Uganda’s citator — each backed by a verbatim span from the citing judgment, and are not an assertion that this case is, or is not, good law.

• Mutende Gonzaga v Uganda (Criminal Application No. 3 of 2018) followed

The original judgment as reported. Read the original PDF before relying on any passage.