A man who was sentenced to 20 years in prison for killing his abusive father in 2005 has qualified to be released under state law and is set to be released.
Mulumba Kazigo, 41, filed an application in January to be resentenced under the Domestic Violence Survivors Justice Act, a law which went into effect in 2019 and allows judges to use discretion when sentencing offenders who were coerced into crime as a result of abuse. He has been in prison since 2006.
Kazigo was the son of Dr. Joseph Kazigo, a doctor at Nassau County Medical Center. According to the county district attorney, Dr. Kazigo abused his children and their mother physically and psychologically for decades.
On Aug. 24, 2005, Mulumba entered his father’s apartment, where he was sleeping and beat him over the head with a baseball bat then slit his throat and disposed of the body in a wooded area. He was indicted in Sept. 7 of that year for second-degree murder, first-degree burglary and tampering with physical evidence.
Mulumba Kazigo was 26 at the time and pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of first-degree manslaughter and was sentenced to 20 years in prison.
Two days before the killing, Joseph Kazigo had beat Mulumba because he had forgotten to mow the lawn. His siblings begged him to apologize for it, saying that Joseph would take it out on them and their mother, according to a statement from the district attorney. Mulumba Kazigo then decided to kill his father upon the realization that he had been beating his mother for years and felt a need to stop the ongoing violence.
“The Domestic Violence Survivors Justice Act was written to help survivors of abuse like Mulumba Kazigo, who are imprisoned for protecting themselves. Given the overwhelming evidence of sustained abuse, and that the abuse was a contributing factor to the killing of his father, we recommend that he be resentenced and released,” Nassau County District Attorney Madeline Singas said in a statement.
Judge David Sullivan vacated the original sentence Thursday and resentenced Kazigo to five years in prison and five years of post-release supervision. A spokesperson for the district attorney’s office said because Kazigo has already served more than that amount, he is eligible for release, although she could not say exactly when he will be released.
