Ntakirwa Apollo & Anor v Uganda (Criminal Appeal No. 172 of 2012)

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

On a first appeal against a murder conviction, the Court of Appeal re-evaluated the evidence and upheld the conviction, holding that even setting aside the contested evidence of PW8, other evidence — including PW7, PW2 and the recovery of weapons from one appellant's home — corroborated PW8 and properly placed the appellants at the scene of the crime. On sentence, the Court held that two persons convicted of murdering the same person in the same circumstances should receive the same sentence; it accordingly substituted the life imprisonment imposed on one appellant with 14 years' imprisonment, to match the 14 years imposed on the co-appellant, having regard to the time spent on remand.

Outcome

Conviction upheld; one appellant's life sentence reduced to 14 years to equalise the sentences of both appellants

Facts

On 25 May 2009 the deceased was sent by his mother to buy maize flour at about 7pm and never returned; the next morning his parents were informed he had been murdered and his body found in the forest, killed with a sharp object. PW8 testified that on the night, near a borehole by the forest, he heard an alarm and found Moses and Ntakirwa, with about four others, beating the deceased, but did not intervene as he believed they were relatives. PW7, a bodaboda cyclist, testified that he met the 1st appellant near the scene, who asked him to tell the deceased he was waiting for him, and later that night saw the deceased heading there. PW2 testified that the appellants implicated each other and that he passed a man in an overcoat resembling the 1st appellant's. PW9 recovered a spear and an iron bar from the 2nd appellant's demolished house. A dispute arose over whether PW8 was a person who had been in prison; the trial judge found the prison records related to a different person.

Issues

1. Whether the trial court erred in relying on the evidence of PW8 to convict the appellants where it was alleged he was serving a prison sentence at the time of the offence.
2. Whether the sentences passed on the appellants were harsh and excessive, and whether the appellants should receive a uniform sentence.

Orders

• The conviction of the appellants is upheld.
• The 2nd appellant's sentence of life imprisonment is substituted with 14 years' imprisonment from the date of conviction (26/07/2012).
• The 1st appellant's sentence of 14 years' imprisonment is upheld.

Rules and key headnotes

Legislation cited (3)

• Penal Code Act s.188
• Penal Code Act s.189
• Court of Appeal Rules Rule 30(1)

Cases cited (5)

• Kifamunte Henry v Uganda (Criminal Appeal No. 10 of 1997)
• Pandya v R [1957] EA 336
• Bogere Moses v Uganda (Criminal Appeal No. 1 of 1997)
• Kyalimpa Edward v Uganda (Criminal Appeal No. 10 of 1995)
• Kyewalabye Bernard v Uganda (Criminal Appeal No. 143 of 2001)

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.

• Ketty Mbabazi v Uganda (Criminal Appeal 276 of 2011)

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