The screaming headline is as disturbing as it is very hard to believe. Well, the prized Investigator can exclusively reveal that fingers are being accusingly pointed at a judge for hatching a plot which saw Mathew Kirabo escaping from justice for the high-profile murder of Desire Mirembe.
While our colleagues elsewhere were busier reporting about this story as per word of actors in court, we were busier digging deeper to try to understand how a lad of Mathew’s relatively young age and station in life, has been really able to play around with justice for years now.
Fortunately, we are glad to report, we have been able to discover something worth the bother we have been subjecting ourselves to for some good time now.
Let it be known that we have gone an extra mile and dug much deeper because we think you, valued readers, deserve better than what the media has been serving you on in regard to one of the saddest chapters in country Uganda’s criminal history.
But first things first. Both Mathew and Desire were medical students at Makerere University at the time one of the country’s ghastly murders occurred. The two were lovers when one of them took the life of the other. The murder took place around May, 2015.
Desire’s rotting body was recovered after a few days, following the commission of the crime of passion, dumped away in a sugarcane plantation in Lugazi along Kampala-Jinja Highway.
Mathew himself led detectives to the place where Desire’s body was, having acknowledged earlier on to have cut short the life of the young lady. Mathew Kirabo would, later after seven years, pull off an intriguing escape amid court trial for the gruesome murder.
We can now reveal that the escape wasn’t a one off. This disturbing form of miscarriage of justice had actually been planned for some good months before it was finally pulled off.
Yet, what is most astonishing and very fascinating at the same time is the fact that a prominent judge in town appears to have been the key instigator of the wicked plot. This stance, as if judges aren’t meant to be vanguards of justice.
Well, as parents of the slain third year female medical student grapple with the vanishing of the young man who confessed to taking her life, distressing exclusive news breaking in suggest that a judge, of all people, planned, aided and executed the escape.
The judge whose particulars we are holding for legal reasons is understood to be a relative of the suspect. Our investigations carried out even within the judiciary itself suggest that the judge on the spot had been using her influence to block the prosecution of her relative ever since the murder first came to light.
This, even after Mathew himself, as we have already reported here, confessed on his own volition to have killed and concealed Desire’s body in some sugarcane plantation in Lugazi. To start with, there was a lot of pressure for the case to be tried in Kampala. Kindly hold on, we will tell why this was the case.
But following a lot of pressure exerted by Emmanuel Musoke, Desire’s relentless father, then principal Judge, Yorokamu Bamwine directed the trial to be held in Mukono.
The other judge had intrigued to have the trial held in Kampala. Why Kampala was being proposed as the trial venue for the case. The whole trick was to have the consequential trial, sentencing and conviction declared a nullity and hence an exercise in futility.
Look, the murder under review was committed in Mukono. So, there was no way under the law, unless if it were expressly permitted by the chief justice, the high court in Kampala could have had jurisdiction to preside over this matter. Period! Following the Principal Judge’s direction for the trial to be held in Mukono, the trial would again suffer another snag.
First of all, each time a list of criminal cases to be tried would come up, one of the key people would be missing. The Investigator now understands, it was the other powerful relative of Mathew deeply rooted in the judiciary who was using her leverage to block the case from being cause listed among those which were supposed to be heard.
As Mzee Musoke fought hard to have the matter finally listed for trial, the judiciary defensively and suspiciously informed the country that there was no money to facilitate the trial.
Truth of the matter, the other lady justice was still alive and spiritedly working behind the scenes to block the wheels of justice from moving on smoothly. In yet another signal of the kind of fate which was awaiting justice in this otherwise sad chapter, Justice Henry Kaweesa would after the commencement of the hearing grant bail to the suspect.
What the judge did can be likened, in all fairness and due respect, to granting Lucifer a walk out of hell! Lucifer knows too well that he is supposed to burn in hell. So, he won’t hesitate even for one second to take off given such a chance.
Anyway, Kaweesi granted Mathew bail to purportedly facilitate his travel to the US to complete his studies. This was in the year 2016. Mathew somehow returned to the country and kept around town while religiously answering to his bail.
Following the commencement of the trial and after sensing from the testimony which was being given against him that he was possibly heading for the gallows or a long haul in prison, Mathew and his influential relative in the judiciary started plotting on how to flee from justice.
They started by conning the trial judge to surrender the passport which had been retained by court to stop the suspect from using the travel document to run out of jurisdiction. Mathew deceived the judge through his lawyer, Isaac Kato how he was going for an urgent business in the US and, as such, required the passport in the hands of court to be able to travel.
Dramatically, Mathew, whose attorney had just reported was unable to attend the day’s court session because he was preparing for the journey, was later on discovered seated inside a black car parked right there in the court’s parking lot!
Having thus miserably failed to con court into releasing the passport, Mathew and his crafty judicial officer relative elected he was going to leave the country with or without the passport. The plotters of this kind of disturbing perversion of justice, knew, of course, the immense trouble they were exposing the sureties to, by plotting Mathew’s escape.
The sureties including Mathew’s mother, Imelda Wabulengo had pledged to pay a fine of up to UGX150m to the State in the event of failure to deliver the suspect to court for trial. Well, something as little as UGX150m wasn’t going to prove a big deal to the relatives of Mathew who boast of enormous wealth.
So, a decision was finally made for Mathew to leave the country and leave it to the relatives staying back to pay off the State. Mathew, having failed to show up for trial for three consecutive days, Justice Kaweesi directed the willing sureties to pay the UGX150m or else rot in jail. You could have been there present in the courtroom to see how the sureties quickly mobilized the colossal fine and handed the huge sums of cash to the court`s coffers!
As we speak, the court assessors have since desperately asked Justice Kaweesi to convict the suspect but who, as we have told you, is somewhere outside Uganda enjoying freedom. The judge also fixed the matter for judgment sometime in April and urged police to quickly find the suspect. This, as if the suspect is an imbecile as to be too foolish to keep in the way of the police!
As this trial turns into drama, the parents of Desire are aching, unable to fathom how someone who killed their promising daughter can be left to enjoy life after doing everything to help the courts of law dispense justice in this matter…
Author Profile
- Mr. Stephen Kasozi Muwambi is a seasoned crime investigative writer, majoring in judicial-based stories. His two decades’ experience as a senior investigative journalist has made him one of the best to reckon on in Uganda. He can also be reached via [email protected]
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