Senior manager kills motorist in Nairobi road rage incident

NAIROBI, COUNTY: A senior manager with an insurance firm has been arrested after he shot and killed a motorist and injured another one in a road rage incident in Dagoretti area, Nairobi.

The manager identified as Fredrick Mwangi is a licensed gun holder, police said. He shot and killed a mechanic identified as Francis Ambudo, 44 who was driving home with his elder brother Boaz, 46 on Friday night after a brief altercation on the road near Nakumatt Junction.

According to police, the deceased and his brother had been at Aquarium Bar near Nakumatt Junction and had joined Old Naivasha Road driving towards Kawangware when the gunman stopped abruptly.

This was after they had driven for almost a kilometre to near Melzedek Hospital.

Nairobi deputy police boss Moses Ombati quoted Mwangi saying he spotted the deceased’s car trail him for long and mistook them for thugs.

“He stopped few meters away from where the other motorists had joined the road and sought to know why they were trailing him. The other men told him off saying they had not seen him and were from a bar near the scene,” said Ombati.

He said it was at that point that the gunman fired and killed the driver before injuring his brother.

The gunman then drove off and later told police he had killed carjackers who planned to attack him.

“We have since arrested and disarmed him after realizing this was pure road rage incident, misuse of gun. He will face murder charges in court on Monday or Tuesday,” said Ombati.

Boaz who survived the shooting is at the MP Shah Hospital in critical but stable condition.

The shooting is the latest in a series of incidents of misuse of firearms in Nairobi.

Last Monday, a CID officer in Lari shot and injured himself in the leg while driving on Thika Road in mysterious circumstances.

In Parklands, a police reservist was disarmed by security guards after he shot in the air in a bid to force his way into a women’s hostel.

Police said the man was dropping off a female friend, a student at the Executive Ladies Hostel.

And when security guards prevented him from driving his vehicle into the hostel grounds, he took out a pistol and fired in the air twice.

Police rushed to the scene and arrested him before they seized the pistol, three magazines and 90 bullets, a police radio, his firearm’s certificate, a beret and a Kenya Police Reservist ID.

Cases of misuse of firearms are on the rise calling for stringent measures to curb them.