Security guard remanded over Kabowa murders

Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | A private security guard has been remanded to Kitalya prison for the alleged murder of two people in Kabowa zone, Rubaga division.

Geoffrey Duku on Friday was arraigned before the Makindye Chief Magistrates Court presided over by Anne Sarah Basemera, who read to him two counts of murder that were contained in two separate files.

Court heard that on December 16, 2020, with malice aforethought, Duku unlawfully killed Roland Akaturinda in Kabowa zone in Rubaga division in Kampala district, and on January 25, 2022, at the same scene, also killed Patrick Turyasingura.

The bodies of the deceased whose postmortem reports show that they had been strangled to death were retrieved on January 29, 2022, and February 3, 2022 in a septic tank at the home of businessman Charles Tumwine.

However, Duku who was looking composed was told not to say anything in relation to the crime since the Chief Magistrates Court has no jurisdiction to try capital offenses.

The Chief Magistrate Basemera has also informed Duku that he will be tried in the High Court and it’s where he will exercise his right to apply for bail. But the State Attorney Lydia Nakato informed the court that investigations in the two cases of murder are still ongoing.

Basemera remanded Duku up to March 3, 2022 when he will be returning to court to be informed of the status of investigations. As he was being taken to the holding cells, Duku told journalists that he is an innocent person who has never killed anybody and had worked in Kabowa for close to two years.

Trouble for Duku started after Norman Muhangi, a brother to Turyasingura reported to Kabowa police post on January 26, 2022 that Turyasingura was missing and needed the police to help him in the search.

In the process, Naomi Tumwine, the wife to Tumwine reported to neighbors that she had recovered Turyasingura’s body from a septic tank at their home in Kabowa.

As a result, the police arrested Tumwine, Naomi, and Muhangi to help in investigations on grounds that they had inconsistencies in their statements.

But police discovered another decomposing body believed to be of Akandinda who had gone missing in December 2020 also in the same septic tank.

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