Police ballistic experts start job of examining Bugingo’s car

Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT |  Police ballistic experts have started examining the vehicle in which Pastor Aloysius Bujingo and his assistant were shot in.

Bujingo was shot at Buwalakata road, Namungoona, in Lubaga Division, on Tuesday by gunmen moving on a motorcycle. His bodyguard who doubled as driver and assistant Richard Muhumuza died on the spot.

Muhumuza aged 45 hailed from Sembabule district. According to his brother Geoffrey Kayumba and Lwbitakuli village chairman Stephen Ssenyonyi Muhumuza left three children and has since tasked the government to expedite the murder investigations.

Muhumuza was one of the highly trained body-to-body secret service guards.

Although police pathologists found more than 10 bullet wounds in Richard Muhumuza’s body, it raised questions on how Bujjingo was able to drive the car from the crime scene to Mulago Hospital.

Since yesterday, the media have been questioning where the vehicle was kept after it was delivered Muhumuza’s body to Mulago Hospital.

However, URN has established that the vehicle with the personalized number plate PRAIZ GOD is currently parked at the Directorate of Forensic Science-DFS at Naguru alongside the vehicles in which AIGP Andrew Felix Kaweesi, Muhammad Kirumira, Sheikh Maj Muhammad Kiggundu and CAO Charles Ogwang were assassinated.

Sources have said that five ballistic and forensic experts have been assigned to examine Bujingo’s vehicle purposely to establish the shooting angles. “Bullet cartridges from the crime scene and those found inside the car as well bullets found in Muhumuza’s body will be examined to establish vehicle and body penetration angles and range,” sources said.

Analysis of vehicle and body penetration will help ballistic and forensic experts to establish the distance at which the shooters were and the angles at which they were standing. A bullet shot at a close range and that fired a distance have different penetration impact.

So far, it has been established that Bujingo’s vehicle was not riddled with bullets as it happened in other assassinations involving prominent individuals. For instance, Gen Edward Katumba Wamala’s army was shot from behind and the first target was the tyres to stop it from moving. Gen Katumba survived with bullet wounds but his daughter Brenda Nantongo died on the spot.

In Andrew Felix Kaweesi’s murder, the assassins first inflated the tyres before they pumped dozens of bullets inside it leaving him dead alongside his bodyguard Kenneth Erau and driver Godfrey Wambewo.

Major Muhammad Kiggundu’s murder did not differ from the assassin’s modus operandi.

But in Bujingo’s incident, tyres were not targeted and he survived all the more than 10 bullets with minor scratches.

“Detectives recorded the first statement from Pr Bujingo but they will have a second interaction with him before the end of the week. We might record several statements from him since he is now the key witness in this incident,” sources said.

Luke Owoyesigyire the Deputy Kampala metropolitan police spokesperson, said investigators are going to largely rely on CCTV cameras to establish whether Bujjingo’s attackers were trailing him or they waited for him at the spot.

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