KAMPALA, UGANDA — The Supreme Court has upheld the murder convictions and 20-year prison sentences imposed on Police Constable Jaden Ashraf and Sandra Nakungu over the killing of businessman Eriya Bugembe Ssebunya, popularly known as Kasiwukira.
A five-member panel of the Supreme Court dismissed the duo’s second appeal on September 17, 2026, finding no basis to overturn the convictions and sentences previously imposed by the High Court and upheld by the Court of Appeal.
Kasiwukira was killed on October 17, 2014, after he was knocked down by a motor vehicle while jogging near his home in the Muyenga Diplomatic Zone in Kampala. A post-mortem examination found that he died from multiple crash injuries.
Ashraf and Nakungu were charged alongside Kasiwukira’s widow, Sarah Nabikolo Ssebunya. In October 2016, High Court Judge Wilson Masalu Musene acquitted Nabikolo but convicted Ashraf and Nakungu and sentenced each to 20 years in prison.
The two later challenged their convictions before the appellate courts, arguing that the prosecution case relied heavily on circumstantial evidence and that the evidence did not sufficiently link them to the murder.
They also argued that Nabikolo’s acquittal weakened the case against them because she had been accused of being involved in the alleged planning of the killing.
However, the Supreme Court rejected the arguments, holding that there was independent evidence linking Ashraf and Nakungu to the offence.
The court found that evidence relating to the alleged planning of the killing, the presence of the appellants at relevant locations and the vehicle allegedly used in the attack formed a consistent chain of circumstantial evidence pointing to their participation.
The justices further held that the acquittal of one accused person does not automatically result in the acquittal of co-accused persons where there is separate evidence establishing their individual criminal responsibility.
The Supreme Court therefore dismissed the appeal, leaving the convictions and 20-year prison sentences intact.
The decision brings to a close another stage of a murder case that has remained before Uganda’s courts for more than a decade, dating back to Kasiwukira’s death in 2014.
