It will be noted that the above submission by learned Counsel for the Applicant was partly in response to the Motion by the State and partly in reply on point of law, in respect of her own application. She later filed a Further Reply on points of law on 17/6/2010. There she submitted first, that Ext A annexed to Further Counter Affidavit is not an indictment properly filed before this Court as the document bears the same suit number as the Applicant’s application. Secondly, Counsel disagreed with the State Counsel that Rape carries a sentence of death on conviction pursuant to Section 99(1) of CPC as amended by Act No. 2 of 2002. Rather, Counsel submitted, the penalty for rape is life imprisonment as provided in Section 122 of the Criminal Code. But Counsel added that punishment is “not mandatory, it merely means that upon conviction of same, the Court has the discretion to impose any sentences up to life imprisonment unlike the offence of murder whose punishment is a mandatory death sentence”; and thirdly, even if “the applicant has been properly charged with rape before the Court, the offence is bailable”. Counsel then submitted that the CPC Amendment “denies bail to any person charged with any offence which carries a mandatory punishment of “death” or “life imprisonment”. She finally urged me to grant bail to applicant upon any conditions this Court will deem fit to make pending any charges that may be brought against him. 6

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