A police constable and a middle aged man were on Thursday sentenced to serve 20 years in prison for killing a disabled trader in 2017.
Justice Kanyi Kimondo found Constable Alex Odhiambo Omondi and Joseph Kinyanjui guilty of killing Henry Wachira at Kora shopping centre of Mathioya Sub County.
From evidence adduced from various prosecution witnesses, the court established that the two jointly clobbered Wachira leaving him with grievous injuries which later occasioned his death.
In the March 17 incident that occurred between 9.30 to10 pm, commotion erupted in the bar where they were taking beer whereby Omondi and Kinyanjui descended on Wachira with pieces of wood leaving him nursing serious injuries.
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The court heard that the deceased could not run away due to his disability with the convicts taking advantage to beat him.
Wachira who operated a bar in the area stayed for about eight hours before being taken to hospital.
One of the witnesses claimed that the deceased was bundled in a taxi’s boot and taken to Kamune health centre but was referred to Murang’a Level 4 hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival.
The judge indicated that Omodi failed to take the deceased to a nearby health facility but instead took him to distant Kamune health centre and further kept Wachira in the boot of a taxi for long despite his critical condition.
“The postmortem confirmed the deceased was clobbered, despite being a person living with disability. From the evidence, Omondi called for a taxi for personal interest to seek treatment, ignoring the plight of Wachira, who he bundled in the boot of the vehicle,” said the judge.
Kinyanjui, a civilian had visited his brother, an administration police man at Kora camp and joined Omondi in beating the bar operator.
“Investigating officer in the murder, when he testified in court was not prepared and he was not useful to the court as he contradicted himself,” said the judge.
In his defense, Omondi said the deceased attacked him with his walking stick injuring his head and that he did not have energy to attack Wachira.
He added that it was at night and so no one could attest that he was the one who injured the deceased.
Kinyanjui on his part said he had gone to visit his brother at the police camp and during that incident, he just heard commotion but did not take part in beating the deceased.
The Judge rejected their defense saying the prosecution proved beyond doubt that the two attacked the deceased leaving him with injuries.
In their mitigation the two pleaded for leniency saying they regretted Wachira’s death.
The Judge ordered the conviction to include period they were in remand before they were released on bond. He gave the two 14 days to appeal if not satisfied with the sentence.
