Oroma and Anor v Uganda (Miscellaneous Application 192 of 2022)
Observed later treatment
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Holding
The High Court held that where a convicted person serving a prison sentence is subsequently convicted and sentenced in a separate trial before expiration of the first sentence, the sentences run consecutively unless the sentencing court expressly orders concurrent service. Section 122(1) of the Trial on Indictments Act establishes cumulative sentences as the default position. Section 106(2), which provides that sentences commence from the date pronounced, is subject to Section 122(1). The application was dismissed and the applicants' sentences ordered to run cumulatively.
Outcome
Applicants' sentences from two separate trials to be served consecutively
Facts
The applicants were convicted in two separate criminal trials. On 5 October 2017, they pleaded guilty in Criminal Session Case No. 920 of 2016 before Justice Yasin Nyanzi in Entebbe to five counts of aggravated robbery and one count of attempted murder, receiving 11 years imprisonment on each count. On 8 December 2017, while serving that sentence, they entered a plea bargain before Justice John Wilson Kwesiga in Criminal Session Case No. 369 of 2014 in Kampala and were sentenced to 10 years imprisonment. Uganda Prisons Authority informed them the sentences would run consecutively. The applicants sought an order that both sentences run from their respective dates of pronouncement, arguing this was required by Section 106(2) of the Trial on Indictments Act and the Constitutional Sentencing Guidelines.
Issues
- Whether sentences imposed in two separate criminal trials should run concurrently from the dates they were pronounced, or consecutively.
- Whether Section 106(2) of the Trial on Indictments Act requires sentences to commence from the date pronounced regardless of prior convictions.
- Whether Section 122(1) of the Trial on Indictments Act mandates consecutive sentences where a person is convicted and sentenced in a second trial while serving a sentence from an earlier conviction.
Orders
- Application dismissed.
- Sentences shall run cumulatively.
Rules and key headnotes
Legislation cited (12)
- Constitution of the Republic of Uganda Article 139(1)
- Judicature Act s.33
- Judicature Act s.39
- Judicature (Criminal Procedure) (Application) Rules S.I. 13-8 r.2
- Judicature (Criminal Procedure) (Application) Rules S.I. 13-8 r.3
- Trial on Indictments Act s.106(2)
- Trial on Indictments Act s.122(1)
- Trial on Indictments Act s.110(c)(i)
- Constitutional (Sentencing Guidelines of the Courts of Judicature Practice Directions) 2013 Clause 16
- Penal Code Act s.285
- Penal Code Act s.286(2)
- Penal Code Act s.204
Cases cited (2)
- Matovu Kenneth v Uganda (Criminal Revision No. 394 of 2014)
- Chilemba v R [1969] EA 497
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.
Full judgment
The original judgment as reported. Read the original PDF before relying on any passage.