A security guard has shot dead a suspected thug while stealing offertory money Lubaga Catholic Shrine at St. Mary Cathedral in Rubaga Division Kampala.
The Kampala Metropolitan police spokesperson, Patrick Onyango identifies the deceased as William Otuke.
He was reportedly part of a gang of machete-wielding thugs that raided Lubaga Catholic Shrine around 3 am this morning and started robbing offertories.
According to Onyango, the guard who is attached to Securex Security Company heard the break-in and responded by releasing bullets that killed Otuke.
The guard has since recorded a statement about the incident at Old Kampala police station detailing what transpired before and after he discharged bullets at the thugs. The deceased’s body is lying at the City mortuary. Lubaga Catholic Shrine contains images and statutes that resonate with the history of Catholicism in Uganda, white fathers and past clergy.
The raid on the shrine comes a month after unidentified thugs raided St Augustine Chapel at Makerere University and made off with offertories. The Chaplain, Fr. Josephat Ddungu released CCTV footage showing the thug breaking into the chapel on the night of August 12 around midnight and making off with an unspecified sum of money.
Other items that were stolen from the chapel included laptop, extension cables, boxes where the offertory for Mother Mary and Radio Maria were being kept. He asked members of the public to help identify the thief.
“So we’re able to see him on CCTV camera footage and that is the video clip that we’re circulating right now because he looks familiar from the way he went around he seems to have knowledge of where we keep our stuff,” Ddungu said.
Though same footage was shared with police, police have never come out to confirm whether the suspect was arrested. Ddungu said the Chapel administration could hardly tell how much money was in the stolen offertory boxes.
