WESTERN PROVINCE

NYAMASHEKE — The Police in Ruharambuga Sector, Nyamasheke District, are holding a woman who is alleged to have killed her own husband.

Fauste Mukabahizi, 34, a resident of Buvungira village, Buvungira Cell in Bushekeli Sector ,was arrested on Saturday after allegedly killing her spouse Augustine Sinamenye Alias Ndoreyaho, 35. The incident reportedly took place on Monday, May 19 at around 8:24 p.m at their home.

Police sources at Ntendezi Police station, where Mukabahizi is detained, said the suspect found her husband drunk, slain him using a pang and later dragged and buried the body in a ditch in their bedroom.

The police worked on a tip off by a resident called Cyprian Ntawumenyumunsi, who smelt a stinking body near the home of the deceased where he had gone to collect grass for his cow.

Mukabahizi may have killed her husband because he was against her habit of theft, neighbours alleged. According to the neighbours, the woman has been fond of stealing people’s properties in the area, an act which was not approved of by the deceased. And she has on several occasions been beaten up by her neighbours on accusations of stealing their agricultural produce and clothes.

"According to my own observation and understanding as a person who has been living with the deceased (Ndoroyaho) and his wife, I believe Mukabahizi murdered her husband simply because she knew that the deceased was against her theft habits in the area," Samuel Karangwa, a close neighbour to the family told The New Times.

In the meantime, Mukabahizi admitted at the police station to killing her husband. However, she denied the act was motivated by the claims of residents.

She explained that she committed the act as a preemptive move because the deceased has been threatening her with death. The deceased has even been beating her up and their children, she claimed.

"I agree that I am the one who killed my own husband (Ndoreyaho) using a pang at around 8:24 in the evening at our home. But I did it because he (the deceased) has been beating me up on baseless grounds whenever he would return home while drunk. And on top of that he has been telling me that he would kill me any time," Mukabahizi told The New Times in an interview on Saturday.

"I don’t regret my action because I led him where he wanted to put me. Those ones who say that I killed him because he was against my habits of stealing agricultural products and clothes in the area are totally lying because I have never been a thief."

Since their marriage in 1995, the couple has had four children, two girls and two boys. Their youngest child is only four months.

The deceased has been a carpenter while Mukabahizi has been a farmer.

Superintendent Wilson Ntaganda, the Nyamasheke District Police Commander, said that family conflicts are among the top crimes in the district, according to their criminal records. But he said they would do all what is possible to reduce such problems through community policing.

This is the second similar incident in the area. Early in May, an elderly woman, Maria Nyirarutinya was murdered by unknown assailants in Butangata village, Nyarusange, Bushekeli Sector, according to area Executive Secretary Eloi Munyanyindi.

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