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Luwero, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | Three people have been remanded to Butuntumula prison and 37 others are in police custody over acts of mob justice in Luwero district.
The three accused persons are Mathias Ssekayingo, Isma Maganda, and Saddam Felix, all residents of Ndibulungi village in Luwero district. They appeared before Luwero Chief Magistrate Samuel Munobe on charges of attempted murder.
According to the prosecution led by Luwero State Attorney Roseline Kipwola, the accused persons together with others at large on May 27 attempted to murder Sunday Ekol in Ndibulungi village.
Kipwola asked the court to adjourn the case until the State completes investigations into the matter. The accused denied the offense and a plea of not guilty was entered.
The Chief Magistrate remanded them to Butuntumula prison till July 28 when they will return for a mention of their case.
On Friday, Sunday Ekol, a worker at a sugarcane plantation belonging to Victoria Sugar Limited and a woman hired a boda boda rider Stephen Ssenkosi from Ndibulungi trading center at 3,000 shillings to transport them to the plantation on Friday last week.
However, when they reached the sugarcane plantation, a disagreement broke out after the boda boda rider received 10,000 Shillings but decided to return a balance of only 5,000 instead of 7,000 Shillings.
The two protested and demanded the balance but the boda boda rider decided to raise an alarm claiming that they wanted to rob his motorcycle.
The boda boda rider instead rang his colleagues who responded by arresting and transferring Sunday to Ndibulungi trading center where they beat and chopped off some of his fingers leaving him lying unconscious until he was rescued by the police.
Police arrested the three accused persons but others including Ssenkosi went into hiding.
When his fellow workers got the news, they also decided to attack over 20 households and cut down food crops, and vandalized shops in a revenge attack.
Police arrested 66 suspects over the revenge attack but after the screening, 37 suspects remained under detention at Luwero Central Police Station.
The Luwero District Police Commander Living Twazagye says that the State Attorney has sanctioned charges of moving with a weapon in public against the remaining suspects.
Twazagye adds that the group will also be presented to court soon after investigations into the case are completed as State Attorney advised.
According to the police crime report, Luwero district registered the highest cases of mob action which left 21 people killed in 2021.
The district was also ranked second with the highest cases of malicious damages after registering 146 cases.
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