KAMPALA – Court has the deferred the judgment of the Pine car case in which 8 suspects are accused of the murder of a businesswoman Betty Donah Katusabe in 2015 to June 17.
Justice Flavia Anglin Ssenoga was expected to deliver her judgement on Thursday 30, however, she instead informed suspects, their lawyers and the state attorneys handling the matter that the judgement is not yet ready because she is still working on it given the voluminous submissions.
Mr. Muhammad Sebuufu, the proprietor of pine motor car bond is charged alongside 7 other people for the kidnap and murder Katushabe for over a 9 million shillings car debt that she had delayed to pay.
Other suspects are; Godfrey Kayiza, Philip Mirambe, Stephen Lwanga, Yoweri Kitayimba, Damaseni Ssentongo, Paul Tasingika, and Shaban Otuddu.
Mr. Sebuufu and the group had been jointly indicted with the former Kampala CPS DPC Aaron Baguma for Katushabe’s kidnap and murder but at the beginning of the trial, the DPP without giving any reason to court dropped charges against Baguma and continued with the trial of Ssebuufu and the rest.
A summary of prosecution evidence is that Katushabe bought a car from Pine car bond at Shs13M of which she only paid Shs5M and left a balance of Shs9M.
Prosecution’s evidence from 26 witnesses further shows that the deceased after failing to pay the balance, Sebuufu hired a team of his security guards to pick her from her residence in Bwebajja along Entebbe road and directly drove to his office at pine car bond on Lumumba Avenue ;from where she was kicked and beaten with sticks thereby causing grievous wounds to her body which led to her death.
The prosecution contends that the accused persons and others still at large, on October 21 at Pine car bond on Lumumba Avenue in Kampala killed Katusabe and robbed her of her mobile phone valued at Shs300, 000 and immediately or after the said robbery, used a panga and sticks harm her which caused her death.