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Father, witchdoctor to hang for murdering baby
Court in Kampala has sentenced a father who surrendered his two-month-old son for ritual sacrifice and the witchdoctor who carried out the murder to death.
What you need to know:
Ritual sacrifice. Prosecution says the father mutilated his son’s body and presented some of the parts to a witchdoctor in Mubende.
Kampala. The High Court in Kampala has sentenced a father who surrendered his two-month-old son for ritual sacrifice and the witchdoctor who carried out the murder to death.
Justice Elizabeth Kabanda on Thursday convicted Ali Mugerwa and Teopista Nakakande Mufumba for aggravated trafficking causing death.
“Both convicts committed the offence. The manner in which the child was killed and dumped like garbage is an indication that the offence was premeditated. Accused number one (Mugerwa) breached the contract of protecting his child,” the judge ruled and described the offence as a ritual sacrifice, which terminated the victim’s life.
Justice Kabanda dismissed the convicts’ pleas for leniency.
She said the degree of harm to the victim was grave where the baby’s ears and other body parts were mutilated.
The judge said the convicts were so brutal in killing the boy aged two months who was too vulnerable to help itself.
“The evidence, according to prosecution, shows that both the accused persons connived and participated in committing the offence,” Justice Kabanda stated.
Prosecution said Mugerwa picked the baby from their home, mutilated its body and presented some of the parts to Nakakande at her shrine in Kasanda, Mubende District.
Mother recounts
During the trial, Ms Claire Kyalisiima, the mother of the deceased baby, told court that in December 2011, while sleeping in their rented house, Mr Mugerwa disappeared with the child at night and she only saw him two years later. Prosecution told court that on December 9, 2011, Mugerwa and Nakakande and others still at large, at Kibira B Zone killed, removed the body parts of the the boy.
