Three handed life sentences over drug smuggling

Dar es Salaam. The Morogoro High Court sentenced three men to life in jail after they were found guilty of smuggling 20 and 198 kilogrammes of heroin and bhang, respectively.

The trio was sentenced following the end of two distinct trials handled by the High Court’s Corruption and Economic Crimes Division at the Morogoro sub-registry. In the first case, Tanga resident Silvano Maneno Mkasanga, also known as Kelvin, and his accomplice, Ali Khamis Juma, received life sentences for trafficking heroin weighing more than 20 kilogrammes.

Mkasanga was apprehended on April 29, 2021, at the Sangasanga checkpoint in Mvomero District, Morogoro Region, after a tip that he was travelling from Ruvuma Region with a narcotics cargo. Police stopped the Toyota Noah he was travelling in at the checkpoint, where two bags with 20 packets of powdery substances suspected to be narcotic drugs were seized.

The accused allegedly confessed that the drugs were his and that they were intended to be delivered to two people, including Juma, who was to receive five packets at Chalinze.

While on the way to Dar es Salaam for interrogation, police ordered Mkasanga to talk to his intended recipient of the consignment bound for Chalinze, where Juma appeared and was arrested. “Overall, I am not convinced that the defence testimony created any crevices that would, in any way, shake the prosecution’s case, which is built on a firm and solid foundation. I am persuaded to hold that the accused persons committed the offence with which they are charged,” said Judge Mustapha Ismail in his recent decision.

The judge has ordered the destruction of the drugs without delay under the supervision of the court. He has also ordered that the vehicle that was found with the drugs be immediately released to its registered owner because there is no evidence linking him with the offence of drug trafficking.

At the same court, a resident of Kitonga Village in Mvomero District, Ezekiel Christopher Kudula, was sentenced to life imprisonment after he was found guilty of trafficking 198 killogrammes of bhang.

Police received information that a consignment of bhang was about to be trafficked from a house in Kitonga Village, where police stormed and seized 10 bags full of dry leaves that were later confirmed by the government chemist to be bhang.

At the hearing of the case, the accused person denied ownership of the bags that contained the drugs. He told the court that when police officers stormed his house, they informed him they were involved in a crackdown on growers and traffickers of bhang.

He said the police officers told him he was part of a gang involved in drug trafficking. He told the court that the consignment with which he was connected was found in the vehicle into which he was bundled.

He vehemently denied that the bags were recovered from his house. Judge Mustapha Ismail rejected Kudula’s defence, saying he was not convinced that the drugs were planted in his house. “The accused person has stated that he did not know any of the police officers. I see no reason why the police officers would travel all the way to Kitonga Village to fix a person that they did not know before.

“My position is bolstered by the fact that the accused person’s defence has been nothing short of lacklustre.” said judge Ismail.

“My take is that what constituted the defence testimony was, by and large, a bunch of evasive denials that embodied some fits of blatant lies and hardly answered the key question, which is, why the police would settle on him and not any other person,” said judge Ismail.