PICTORIAL: How thugs executed Zzana Mobile money robbery, murder

A joint security team on Friday led four suspects to the crime scene of the robbery and subsequent murder of two mobile money dealers in Zzana.

Early this month, armed thugs travelling on motorcycles attacked a mobile money point at Kirimanyago village, in Zzana, Makindye Ssabagabo in Wakiso district before killing the occupants including Harriet Nalwadda, 33 and Maureen Nakabuubi.

Following a raid at an apartment, Stanley Mulunda alias Frank Jjumba Ssalongo was arrested before in another operation, Emma Onechan and Denis Mangusho both UPDF soldiers were arrested.

At around 1:20pm, a joint security team in a convoy of four vehicles including  personnel from Joint Anti-Terrorist Task Force(JATT), Flying Squad, Counter terrorism police, general duties police ,Local Defence Unit personnel and detectives led by the CID Director, AIGP Grace Akullo arrived at the crime scene in Zzana amid tight security.

Four suspects, one by one were led out of a Flying Squad van heavily guarded before leading detectives to the crime scene.

Dressed in a grey T.Shirt, black jeans and sandals, the first suspected got out of the heavily guarded van before leading the detectives to a place near the mobile money shop which is up to now closed and is where the deceased operated.

A security personnel who was part of the operation but didn’t want to be named identified the suspect as Mulunda and that was showing the detectives how he rode the assailants on a boda before showing them the mobile money point.

The suspect who was on handcuffs was seen making hand gestures to point to the crime scene and the role he played as detectives recorded the proceedings with cameras and phones.

However, the security personnel discovered what they were doing was wrong and for the remaining three suspects, they covered their faces with a purple veil so as to cover their identity.

One by one, the remaining suspects including another boda boda rider and the two UPDF officers led the detectives through how the mission was executed on the fateful day.

In one incident, one of the suspects who the Nile Post has come to learn that he rode the second motorcycle led the detectives to the other side of the rode from where he had waited for the gunners and rode off after the mission.

On a number of occasions, the locals who had crowded around the scene shouted in anger demanding for security to remove the veils from the suspects’ heads.

“You should give them to us so we can finish them off like they did to our colleagues,” the angry locals were heard saying.

Police and LDU personnel had to restrict the locals who now wanted to access the crime scene in a bid to lynch the suspects.

This website identified the other two suspects as Mangusho and Onechan.

Locals speak out

Locals who the Nile Post spoke to but requested to remain anonymous due to security reasons insisted that two of the suspects were known to them.

“Mulunda is a born of this area and at first he was a tipper driver before being relegated to riding boda bodas,”one of the locals said.

According to the locals, the other suspect was a boda boda rider at the Zzana- Ndejje stage and that his face was familiar to them.

Many of them recognized all the four faces of the suspects because of the fateful day, they had pitched camp near the mobile money point for over an hour.

They however said the thugs were in a big group with others operating as observation posts who later alerted the gunners after noticing that the victims had locked their business.

“One of them who was standing near a vehicle in the parking followed them(victims) and grabbed the bag they had. On trying to follow the robber, Nalwadda and Nakabuubi were gunned down,” another resident narrated.

Arrests

Police earlier this month arrested four suspects and recovered three guns with live ammunition and according to the spokesperson, Fred Enanga, the guns, suspects and bullets recovered from the deceased’s bodies were linked.

“All the guns were tested and ballistic evidence linked the suspects to the three murders and five robberies after the guns matched with the shell castings exhibited by their detectives,”Enanga said last week.

He said the police had used data recorded during the gun fingerprinting exercise carried out by the force recently.

Incidents

According to police spokesperson, Fred Enanga, the group and others still at large are to be connected to the multiple shootings in Masaka in which a Toyota Harrier was robbed and later sold in South Sudan.

He said the group on May 4 robbed a bag containing a pressure machine and clothes after mistaking it for cash.

“On May 14, at Nateete, Church Zone, they robbed Mr Dennis Mwesiwa and his wife of Shs610, 000 and other items before shooting dead Rachael Walugembe whereas on May 17 at Kitende A cell, they robbed Sanyu Nalukwago a mobile money dealer of Shs17 million,”Enanga said.

According to police, by the time of their arrest, the group and others still at large were planning to rob a mobile money shop at Mutukula in Rakai district.