The High court in Kampala has handed a 52 year Jail sentence to a UPDF soldier after convicting him on charges of murdering an Eritrean National and Businessman Daniel Michael Weldu in October 2016 and later robbing him of his of his properties.
Captain Mangeni Bumali aka Akeem, attached to the Special Forces Command(SFC) has been sentenced together with his co convicts including lawyer Benon Duncan Lumu and a one Andrew Kisitu.
While sentencing the convicts, Kampala High Court Justice Flavia Angelin Ssenoga ruled that the convicts committed a plea meditated murder without being remorseful, yet they had an option to not committing it.
She further ordered the convicts to compensate Weldu's family 200 million shillings in property they robbed from the victim and further refund the money belonging to the victims which the convicts transferred from his Bank account in Stanbic Bank.
While convicting them, the judge noted that prosecution had adduced sufficient evidence to prove that with intent to murder, the convicts caused the death of Weldu.
However states attorney Jonathan Mugwanya has asked court to sentence the convicts to death on grounds that the convicts committed a capital offence by gruesomely taking away someone's life without any form of remorse because they wanted his property and money.
The convicts are said to have kidnapped the victim and drove him to Jinja were they robbed him before driving him into neighboring Kenya were they killed him from.
Evidence adduced by prosecution further shows that the convicts while driving the victim to Kenya, stopped in Jinja and bought petrol .
And after reaching their destination, the shot him three times in the Chest before setting his body on fire using the said petrol to hid evidence but Kenyan locals managed to put out the fire before it completely burnt him out.
After murdering him, the convicts later took off with the deceased's property including 18,000 US dollars in Cash, his car a Toyota Prado valued at over 220 million shillings,wrist Watch and a Mobile phone.
These were charged with three offences including Murder, Kidnap with intent to murder and aggravated robbery.
Evidence shows that the convicts Kidnapped the victim on the 27th of October 2016 from Kololo, a Kampala suburb with his office at Nakumatti Mall.
The deceased was a businessman with businesses in both Uganda and South Sudan and a resident of Muyenga.
The convicts had lied to the victim that they would help process fir him a VISA to German.