In July this year, Rugirwa Katatumba, a son to the late Bonny Katatumba appeared before court and denied selling Hotel Diplomat to Shumuk Investments Limited Director Mukesh Shukla. In his submission before Grade One Magistrate Stella Maris Amabilis, Rugirwa alleged that Shumuk and others still at large forged documents for the official handover of Hotel Diplomat.
Court decided to involve an expertise hand of police. The latest developments in the case indicate that the some of the signatures on the documents were forged.
According to the Superintendent of police in the Directorate of Forensics who is also a handwriting expert Mr Erisa Ssebufu, the signatures on the sample signatures of the said purported court handover report and those on the specimen signatures had a series of defects.
“I found that the questioned signature on the exhibit attributed to the late Katatumba had a pictorial resemblance with the specimen signatures. However, a detailed examination showed fundamental differences between them. They differed in shape, design and also the crossing lines which were relatively longer on the specimen,” Mr Ssebufu said.
“I also found that the questioned signature attributed to Grace Katatumba is different from the specimen signatures. There was use of dotes in samples which is not observed in the specimen signatures, they are also different in proportion of loops,” he added.
In his final submission, Ssebufu appended that the specimen signatures that even include those of Late Katatumba’s children Angela Katatumba, Rugirwa Katatumba and Ian Katatumba are likely to have been ‘manufactured.’
Shumuk is accused of forging the signatures of the family members Annie Grace Katatumba, Angella Katatumba, Ian Katatumba, Bonny Katatumba and Rugirwa Katatumba. He forged the documents on April 17th, 2015 and November 2017 indicating that Katatumba family had authorized him to take over Hotel Diplomat.