Kampala City businessman Moses Kalungi Alias Billgates has been charged before Buganda Road court, with breaking into his tenant’s shop, stealing property worth Shs 44.4m and remanded to Kitalya government prison.
Kalungi was jointly charged with his son Moses Kabuye who is accused of conspiring with his father to steal 5 Air conditioners, 24 Flat screen TV sets and Air conditioner remotes; the property of VASGARGBET Ltd.
Father and son have faced 3 counts that include shop breaking , theft and conspiracy to steal before Grade One Magistrate Gladys Kamasanyu. However they denied the allegation.
According to Police, the duo allegedly committed the offence with in the Covid-19 lock down on April, 27, 2020 at Kalungi Plaza within Kampala city.
The spokesman of the Criminal Investigations Directorate, Mr Charles Twine, said Mr Kalungi has a sanctioned charge of theft of his tenant’s property and others still pending.
“His actions have warranted us to first take him for medical examination to establish whether he is sane or not. If his mental health is normal, then we shall take him to court on the sanctioned charges,” Mr Twine said.
“On May 6, Mr Smuts took some money to Mr Kalungi at his home, but he rejected it, saying he wanted full payment. He even chased Mr Smuts out of his home with a gun,” Mr Twine said.
Mr Smuts went to CID headquarters where he accepted to pay the full amount and handed it over to police detectives to pass it over to his landlord.
After handing over the money to the police, Mr Smuts went to pick his items from Mr Kalungi’s stores but the TV sets were missing.
“They contacted Mr Kalungi,ho told them to go to his home to pick the rest. At his home, they found only 32 TV sets. Mr Kalungi told his aide to seize the TV sets again and ordered the tenant to get out of his home before he put our detective at gunpoint and confined him until his money was delivered from CID headquarters,” he said.
Following investigations, police also found out that Mr Kalungi had evicted the tenant without a court order and that his actions of depriving the tenant of his property were criminal.
Mr Kalungi was later summoned to record a statement, but he did not turn up.
“The case was processed without his statement and later sanctioned. We have been trying to arrest him in vain because he was moving with a group of people to protect him,” he said.
Their Lawyer Paul Kiggundu explained to court that his clients committed no offence but that the tenant had defaulted on his rent obligations for 2 years and a Civil court ordered for attachment of his property.
He then applied for their freedom but Magistrate Kamasanyu sent them on remand saying she will consider their application on September, 10, 2020 via an audio-visual link from Kitalya Govt prison.