SINARAHA BAYA V. REPUBLIC

JUDGMENT OF THE COURT

1. Sinaraha Baya, the appellant, is challenging both his conviction and sentence for the offence of manslaughter. This being a first appeal, our role is succinctly set out under Section 379 of the Criminal Procedure Code. We are required to subject the evidence adduced at the trial court to a fresh examination and arrive at our own independent conclusions. Nevertheless, we ought not to lose sight of the fact that unlike the trial court, we did not have the benefit of examining the witnesses. See this Court’s decision in Okeno v. R [1972] EA 32.

2. The salient facts that gave rise to this appeal are that on 12^th December, 2012 at around 4:00 p.m. a scuffle arose between the appellant and Dama Katana (the deceased). As to the cause and whether other parties were involved varies with different versions of the events given by the prosecution and the appellant.

3. As per the prosecution, while the deceased and her daughter, Ali Said Fatuma (PW2) were seated outside the h…