The mistrust Kenyans have for pathology reports issued by the Government is the legacy of misdeeds by past chief pathologists such as Dr Jason Ndaka Kaviti.

He and others in the role are believed to have excused away several political murders during the Kanu regime with shameless cover-ups.

After listening to his contorted explanations during the Commission of Inquiry into Dr Robert Ouko’s death, an exasperated Justice Richard Kwach exclaimed: “Doctor, consider yourself lucky you are not consulted by live patients!”

In his presentation, the late Dr Kaviti said the death was a result of suicide. In his theory, which he later recanted, the pathologist suggested that the minister had doused his body with petrol and set himself ablaze then shot himself in the head.

He explained Ouko’s broken legs by imagining a fall after a rope he had tried to hang himself with in another suicide attempt broke. Dr Ian West, a forensic pathologist from Guys and St Thomas Hospitals in London, shredded Kaviti’s suicide theory saying the injuries were consistent with a murder after which the body was set ablaze in an attempt to destroy evidence.

Dr Kaviti made another controversial claim in Julie Ward’s death, claiming the British tourist broke her legs falling from a tree and was killed by wildlife before her body was set ablaze in a fire sparked by lightning. Alternatively, he said the fractures in her bones were from the fire. His theory did not explain why she would abandon her car in a hidden gully and try to sleep in a tree. Dr Adel Shaker contradicted the theory by showing how the tourist was most likely murdered and her body set on fire to conceal evidence of a sexual assault. The post-mortem of Fr Kaiser in 2000 by then Chief Government Pathologist Alex Kirasi Olumbe remains controversial. Dr Olumbe’s autopsy concluded that the gunshot wound on the priest was probably self-inflicted.

This was supported by the findings of a Federal Bureau of Investigations probe. However, given the large number of death threats Fr Kaiser had received from prominent politicians of the day, the two reports remain controversial.

In a story headlined ‘Crime does pay in Kenya”, The Sunday Herald of Australia reported in 2000: “Smart killers can walk away scot-free in Kenya because of serious shortcomings in the country’s forensic medicine capability. That’s the disturbing conclusion reached by one of the few doctors (Olumbe) qualified to carry out autopsies in that part of East Africa.”

The paper quoted Dr Olumbe as saying, “many non-violent killings (by poisoning, for example) are being passed off as natural deaths because of inadequate investigations. Most post-mortems at the city mortuary are conducted by general practitioners completely untrained in forensic medicine.”

The observation ties in with Dr Enoch Kibunguchy’s argument that criminals know the weaknesses in Kenya criminal justice and exploit them aware that they will never be prosecuted.

The former Health assistant minister says pathologists need better equipment and a lighter workload to do their jobs properly.