Tobiko orders file into CJ threat letter re-opened

By Cyrus Mbati

Nairobi,Kenya; DPP wants CID to pursue the case as there are glaring gaps in the investigation that need to be filled

The Director of Public Prosecutions Keriako Tobiko has ordered police to re-open the probe over a threatening letter that was addressed to Chief Justice Willy Mutunga.

This was after police recommended that the file be closed with no further action.

Mr Tobiko told the CID officers who had been assigned the case to pursue the matter because there were gaps in their investigation that needed to be filled.

“I have reached the conclusion that the investigation did not examine or exhaust leads in terms of additional material,” said Tobiko in a letter to the CID Director Ndegwa Muhoro.

He told Mr Muhoro to return the file to his office within 14 days.

The DPP also recommended that security for the judges be boosted.

The investigation was triggered by a letter purportedly written by an entity named Mungiki Group/Kenya Sovereignty Defence Squad in February in which the CJ and other judges were warned of dire consequences over their work.

Legal guidance

Tobiko had appointed a team of prosecution counsel in his office to provide legal guidance and advice in the course of the investigation.

The threats to the judges were issued if they ruled against then presidential candidate Uhuru Kenyatta and his deputy William Ruto in the recent High Court matter challenging their eligibility to contest.

The team of investigators interrogated several people, including youths who were found photocopying the letter in Kibera slums in the city, before closing the file.

Tobiko said in his letter it was not clear why the investigating officers did not follow up and obtain a statement from the account holder of the twitter account @makau_mutua.

“Such statement might have established and clarified the source of the threatening letter considering that the version twitted from that account bore material differences from the original,” says part of the letter.

He added it is not explained why further investigation was not conducted to establish the ownership of the twitter account @mungikipress from which the message referred to by the CJ was sent on February 24.

Tobiko said the possible link between that message, and therefore its authors to the threatening letter, cannot be dismissed.

The DPP said there is no basis of the finding by the team ruling out the possibility of the postage stamp on the envelope having been erased during the sorting out process of the post office and conclusion that such erasure may have been made after collection of the envelope from the post office.

Judiciary reforms

This, according to the police, was meant to conceal the point of postage and thereby the authors but Tobiko says there was no evidence in the file and no record of inquiries conducted on the same.

He told police to investigate the Judiciary staff over their conclusion the threatening letter may have originated from the staff who were unhappy about the ongoing reforms by Dr Mutunga.

“At any rate, that conclusion is at odds with the recommendation of the team that the file should be closed with no further police action as further investigations may warrant investigating the Judiciary staff.

“If it is true as claimed by the team that the judiciary staff originated the offending letter, why should they not be investigated,” asked Tobiko.