KAMPALA, UGANDA: The homicide team at the Criminal Investigations Directorate has obtained travel details from the Immigration department that Francis Onebe, arrested this week over the death of his wife Immaculate Mary Blessing Onebe, had planned two travel trips at the same time.
The body of Immaculate Onebe, who was allegedly kidnapped by unknown men on January 6, was yesterday found inside a septic tank at her matrimonial home in Muyenga, a suburb of Kampala.
Shortly after, police detectives established that Onebe had made an appointment with doctors at a Nairobi hospital where he was to travel on Monday, but he quickly applied for a visa to the United Kingdom.
The change in travel destinations, according to police, came after the arrest of a former security guard at the couple’s home in Muyenga. The guard, only identified as Okariot had disappeared soon after the alleged kidnap but abruptly returned to the same home last week, from where he was arrested.
“When we arrested the guard, we cooperated with Francis (Onebe) and we agreed to work together to find the whereabouts of his wife since we had the guard in our custody. But we placed intelligence officers to track Francis’ movements. We established he was planning to fly out of the country,” a detective said.
The detective added that Okariot had been on the police wanted list since January and when the new guard saw him, he quickly hid in a latrine. However, the new guard locked the latrine and immediately alerted the police, who also informed Onebe that the former guard had scaled over a perimeter wall and gained access to their premises. By the time Onebe reached home, Okariot had been taken to Kabalagala Police Station.
The homicide team headed by Superintendent of Police Monday Agaba, on Wednesday picked Onebe after learning about his intentions to flee the country. But upon arrest, Onebe said he was traveling for treatment, and his earlier reasons to travel to Nairobi also indicated appointments with doctors.
“…As we interrogated the former security guard, he told us that Onebe knew where his wife was. We decided to put them in separate vehicles to lead us to where Mary was and they both took us to Muyenga,” the detective added.
However, detectives are still puzzled by the fact that Mary’s body looked like a person killed less than a month ago. Investigators are wondering where Mary was kept for all that time before she was eventually killed.
Soon after Mary went missing, Onebe reported a case at Kabalagala police, visited Special Investigations Unit –SIU in Kireka, Chieftaincy of Military Intelligence –CMI in Mbuya and Criminal Investigations Directorate claiming he was searching for his missing wife.
Onebe produced a Closed Circuit Television –CCTV clip claiming his wife had been grabbed by men moving in a Drone adjacent to their home. In addition, he placed announcements in newspapers, radios and television stations as well as social media.
Uganda Radio Network –URN on Friday found Onebe being grilled by the homicide team at CID headquarters in Kibuli. This was after he was picked from SIU in Kireka where he is being kept. Police has also drained the septic tank and latrine in search for rudimentary weapons used to killed Mary since she had two deep cuts on the neck.
Kampala Metropolitan Deputy Police Spokesperson Luke Owoyesigyire said police suspect a chain of people involved to disguise the murder as kidnap.
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