A police officer sentenced to 50 years in prison for strangling a colleague’s 9-year-old daughter

A court sentenced a 48-year-old police officer to 50 years in prison after being found guilty of murder by strangulation.
Police Inspector Emmanuel Wilson Abura was found guilty of strangling to death his police colleague’s nine-year-old daughter in a shared house in Naalya housing estate, Kampala.

High Court Judge Margaret Mutonyi, who presided over the police officer’s trial, cited the seriousness of the crime, the manner of carrying out the murder using a leash and the protection of children, arguing that Abura deserved deterrent punishment.

“IP Abura killed an innocent child. His behavior is shameful and disgusting to the police who trained him to protect life. He chose to harm an innocent girl who died a very painful death,” Judge Mutonyi said before describing the police officer as “an animal dressed in human skin” who must be kept away from society for public safety reasons.

The judge explained that Abura, who entered the courtroom supported by crutches, uses his disability as a tool to attract empathy, but needs to work on his soul and tame his inner man because he represents a danger to the human beings around him.

The officer was convicted after the court determined that the prosecution’s evidence directly linked him to the crime scene and that his subsequent conduct was suspicious.

“The prosecution evidence places the accused (PI Abura) at the scene of the crime in the same way that he attempted to lie to the court by saying that he was in a bar shortly after lunch. His alibi was destroyed by his own police statement which was recorded shortly after the incident. His conduct was not that of an innocent person,” Judge Mutonyi said.

The judge ruled that since there was no stranger in the premises and that the accused was seen leaving his house by the parents of the deceased girl only to find their daughter strangled and hanging from a nail with her legs touching the ground , There was no other aggressor than Abura.
This was after prosecutors told the court the officer “painstakingly killed” the boy and threw the keys into the room through the broken grates.

“Consequently, I reject his defense that he was not at the crime scene at that material time and I find him guilty of the crime of murder contrary to articles 188 and 189 of the Penal Code Law as charged and I sentence him.” accordingly as provided for in Section 83 of the Trial on Impeachment Act,” the judge said.

The court heard that the two police officers; IP Abura and the father of the deceased girl, Corporal Joel Mwondha, stayed in the same house.
The house had two access points; that is, the kitchen door and the living room door, each of these accesses being assigned to the respective families.

The name of the deceased has not been revealed because she is a minor.
Justice Mutonyi, however, ruled out the version that the victim may have committed suicide, observing that it is well known that for a person to die by hanging, the body must be suspended, which was not the case in this particular death. .

“The deceased in this case was not suspended but her toes were touching the ground. “This court firmly believes, from the analysis of the circumstantial evidence, that a nine-year-old child would not entertain the idea of ​​receiving a cord which is rarely used for suicide, as opposed to a rope and hanging from a small nail in the door frame,” the judge stated. —Mutonyi observed.
She said she was convinced that there was someone who tied the cord tightly around the girl’s neck and tried to hang her from the nail, which caused her death.

“Therefore, I am convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that the deceased, a little nine-year-old girl who was abandoned at home doing her homework, had no reason to commit suicide by hanging, using the cord of all things, a cord that It wasn’t even inside her. arrive according to the findings of the scene of crime officers (SOCOs),” she said.
The judge said the police officer was free to appeal his decision within 14 days of the ruling date if he was not satisfied.