Musa Musasizi: Dark soul of a serial killer

Musa Musasizi’s descent into darkness is a haunting legend of death and despair that defies understanding. Aged just 23, Musasizi morphed into a remorseless serial killer, leaving a grisly trail of blood in less than a month.

Maclen Ahereza met her death on February 22, 2021, at Musasizi’s hands and this dark compulsion quickly escalated into a relentless spree, claiming the lives of three more women and his innocent three-month-old daughter. Violet Kansime and her baby Abigail Nakitende, Noreen Nabirye, and Elizabeth Mutesi were murdered between March 12 and March 15, 2021.
On December 13, Justice Margaret Mutonyi of the Criminal Division of the High Court handed down a sentence of more than 100 years in prison to Musasizi, who had pleaded guilty to all the murders.

“The young very vulnerable women and children similarly met their gruesome death. He would make love to them, strangulate them using his bare hands, draining the life out of them, and thereafter carry their lifeless bodies, dumping them and burning them using a highly inflammable substance he disclosed to court as petrol/paraffin,” Justice Mutonyi noted.

Angel of death
A common thread unites Musasizi’s victims—they were all female adults, except baby Abigail, who was his daughter. Musasizi’s style of execution was consistent, characterised by strangulation, using his bare hands followed by the gruesome act of burning the bodies.
“The convict [Musasizi] had become a serial killer within a space of few weeks and it is hard to imagine the magnitude of damage he would have continued to cause if he had not been apprehended by the police,” Justice Mutonyi ruled.

In his courtroom statement, Musasizi provides a chilling insight into the depths of his brutality. He admitted to killing his three-month-old daughter because she woke up and cried. The aftermath of his deeds was particularly horrifying. For Kansime and infant Abigail, their bodies were ruthlessly burnt, rendering them unidentifiable. Adding to the grotesque nature of the crime, Musasizi also decapitated Abigail.

The prosecution aimed to categorise the killings as a hate crime, while Musasizi, now 25, committed the murders at the age of 23. His defence emphasised his youthfulness and the fact that he promptly pleaded guilty, avoiding a prolonged trial, as mitigating factors. 
The defence urged the court to consider Musasizi’s demonstrated remorse and his role as a father to a six-year-old child during the sentencing phase. 

Additionally, they highlighted Musasizi’s willingness to apologise to the court and the victims’ families, proposing a rehabilitative sentence not exceeding 30 years, which would run concurrently with previous sentences.
Justice Muntonyi, however, reasoned that given the rising incidence of murders involving women and children, a stringent deterrent sentence was necessary to dissuade others from committing similar crimes. She stressed the severity of Musasizi’s gruesome actions—killing a mother and a three-month-old baby, followed by burning their bodies—emphasising that such heinous acts could not be treated lightly by the court.

“The post-mortem reports and photographs of the charred body of the deceased speaks a lot about the character of the convict. He knew exactly what he was doing. He never wanted the bodies to be identified but be disposed of as bodies of unknown persons. Police just recovered the remaining parts after the predators, possibly dogs, had eaten away parts of the burnt bodies. The baby had no head and part of the neck,” Justice Mutonyi noted.

Musasizi, in his extra-judicial statement before the magistrate that was admitted in evidence, said he was a thief and intended to kill the deceased persons.
Court ruled that Musasizi’s conduct qualifies him to be described as a serial killer, a person who murders three or more persons with the murders taking place over more than a month and including a significant time between them.

Horrific
Musasizi, for example, admitted to killing Nabirye at Mujomba Zone 6, Nakulabye, Rubaga Division in Kampala, solely due to their quarrel over money. The post-mortem report reveals that he strangled her, then callously engaged in a game of Ludo as if nothing had occurred. 
Subsequently, he procured a sack, purchased petrol, placed her lifeless body inside, transported it away from his room, and heartlessly dumped it before setting it ablaze. 

The brutality of the murder was evident in the excessive force he used during the strangulation, resulting in injuries to her brain.
Musasizi murdered Mutesi in Nakulabye, Mujomba Zone 6, Rubaga Division, Kampala. Mutesi, was a 21-year-old woman with a promising future, court documents show. He strangled her to death while they watched a movie. There was no apparent provocation for this violent act, the court heard. Following the cruel murder, Musasizi set Mutesi’s body ablaze.
During court proceedings, it was established that Musasizi lacked a history of mental illness, indicating that his actions were not a result of impaired mental faculties.

Musasizi’s character, Justice Mutonyi ruled, can only be described as wicked, satanic, and evil. By the time he murdered Mutesi, the judge notes, he had turned murdering young women he would lure into a love relationship into a kind of game or sport for him. He had become a habitual sadist who enjoyed causing pain to his girlfriends.
“He derived pleasure in killing young girls after playing sex with them and burning their bodies thereafter,” the judge notes.  

Musasizi’s lawyers had cited the case of a convicted serial killer, Richard Arinaitwe, to persuade the court to be lenient with their client. 
Justice Mutonyi, however, dismissed the reasoning arguing that Arinaitwe was not convicted of murdering five human beings which makes his case distinguishable and not comparable with Musasizi’s.

“My art of discernment tells me that the convict is a psychotic serial killer who is brilliant and wants to manipulate the court by his plea of guilty in all the heinous crimes to attract a lenient sentence. He appears to be very remorseful but he is a very dangerous young man, especially to the many beautiful unsuspecting young women out there… the style he adopted of pretending to be in love with his victims was very attractive yet he knew it was a highway to the grave for all his victims,” the judge ruled.