The joint security team investigating the murder of Susan Magara has recovered several phone handsets and SIM Cards that it believes were used by her kidnappers in the three-week ordeal of the crime that drew widespread public anger in February.
Magara, a 28-year-old accountant at her father’s Bwendero Farm in Hoima District, was kidnapped and murdered despite the family paying the Shs700 million ransom demanded by the kidnappers.
Highly placed security sources told this website that the investigations team, with the help of a suspect who was arrested during the raid on Usafi Mosque in Kisenyi, a Kampala suburb, on Friday, were able to locate the SIM Cards and the phones from different locations where the kidnappers are said to have moved while trying to conceal identity during the kidnapping ordeal.
It had earlier been revealed that the kidnappers used over 20 SIM Cards during the ordeal as they kept confusing security agents trailing them.
CID spokesman Vincent Ssekatte was not available for a comment on the matter but a security source, speaking on condition of anonymity, revealed the SIM cards were found in a house in Buziga, a city suburb, where Magara is believed to have been held hostage and later killed by her captors.
The suspect also led to detectives the vehicle which was used to transport Magara’s body, eventually leading to the arrest of the owner, who is believed to be a woman.
RELATED: Exclusive: Magara torture video recovered as security closes in on killers.
Security sources said the investigations also retrieved several land titles and car sale agreements, which the investigations team believed were bought using the Shs 700m ransom money.
The suspect also took the investigations team to the various scenes of crime as they attempt to put pieces together in the investigation. They are said to have gone to Buziga first, then to Kabaka Anjagala Road in Rubaga Division, Kampala, where Magara was kidnapped from on February 7 and then Kitiko, between Kigo and Kajjansi near the Entebbe Expressway, where her body was found.
This comes a day after this website reported that a video clip showing kidnappers cutting off Susan Magara’s fingers in bid to demand ransom from her parents has been recovered by security agencies. Magara’s fingers had earlier been cut off by the kidnappers who intended to show their determination if a huge sum of ransom was not paid on time.
Even after receiving the ransom, Magara was killed in cold blood, a murder that enraged the nation. Sources added the torture video, which was captured with a phone, has a background of some of the household items found by the investigators in the Buziga house.
Security sources privy to the investigation also revealed that the suspect arrested in the Usafi Mosque raid confessed to have participated in the kidnap and murder of Magara but that he was acting on the orders of someone, whom he is yet to reveal.
far, security has arrested more than 20 suspects over the murder, among them Patrick Agaba, aka Pato, and Ronald Asiimwe, aka, Kanyankole. The investigations team maintains that Pato is still the main suspect and are working around the corner to have extradited from South Africa to face trial.
Sources privy to the investigations had earlier intimated to this website that besides Pato, they are closing in on another family member, who is also believed to be one of the masterminds of the kidnap and murder of Magara. The name of the suspect, sources add, was submitted to the investigation team by the Magara family as part of the group they suspected to have been in the mission to demand the Shs700m ransom.
According to intelligence sources, the family member, whose names have been withheld to avoid compromising investigations, fled the country shortly after Magara’s body was discovered and first went to the Middle East before eventually settling in South Africa.
And now security sources are investigating leads that this family member kept leaking to kidnappers details of the conversation between the family, police, security agencies and President Museveni.
The family member was employed at the family’s Bwendero Dairy Farm in Hoima, where Susan was in charge of managing the finances.
This corroborates with an earlier intercepted audio, where the kidnappers showed clear knowledge of the deceased’s father, implying they were known to the family.
“You know these things, don’t dare include the police, do not inform any security agency and do not waste your time.Do not call Interpol, police or ISO. I know this game, I have played it for long. Otherwise I will do something to Susan (Magara) that you will never forget till you die,” one of the kidnappers is heard saying in Runyoro.
A family member is also heard responding: “I cannot sir, I won’t do it sir, No sir (in Runyoro).
The kidnapper adds: ‘Everything you try to do, everything, I know you, I have read the papers, you stay in Lubowa, I know your home in Hoima, your farm. Be loyal and cooperative or else you will get Susan (Magara) in pieces should you even be lucky. If you mess around you will not get a thing.”
