Residents live in fear as teenagers turn into hardcore criminals

By  Lilian Aluanga-Delvaux

NAIROBI,KENYA: No less than three murders and several stabbings that left at least one victim maimed for life are attributed to him. He is one of the many youth offenders popular for the terror he unleashes on residents of the sprawling Kiamaiko slum.

At 16, Hassan* had earned his ‘badges of honour’ for a litany of crimes in the Nairobi slum.

“He would not hesitate to pull a gun if you crossed his path regardless of your age or whether you knew him or not,” says Jack* who counts himself lucky to have escaped Hassan’s wrath.

“I had known him (Hassan) for some time but for some reason he believed I was giving police information about him. He cornered me one day and threatened to ‘finish me’ but I pleaded my innocence and he let me go,” he says. Tired of the teenager’s reign of terror, a residents’ meeting was convened where Hassan’s family was given an ultimatum to either surrender him to authorities or move out of the area. His family chose the latter.

Before his 17th birthday, Hassan was mowed down by police bullets at what is commonly known as ‘Grao’ (Huruma grounds), a notorious spot for muggings.

He had been on the police radar far some time along with an accomplice, another teenager fast rising up the list of the most dreaded criminals in the area. As proof of his notoriety, a resident talks of the crowds swarming the grounds on they day he was shot dead to catch a glimpse of his lifeless body.

“People spat on him and taunted his father, asking him to collect the body of the criminal he had been hiding,” says the middle-aged man. “He was a child but the evil he committed made it difficult to treat him as such. We were relieved when police took him out,” he says.

The two boys are now part of statistics on children involved in crime. It is a trend probation officers, lawyers, social workers and law enforcers say should cause great concern in a nation with a huge youth population.

Cases collapse

Chief Inspector Catherine Ringera, who is in charge of Huruma Police Station, says youngsters in the area are firmly in the clutches of crime. A day before The Standard On Saturday interviewed her, a 17-year-old mugger known to carry a pistol on his missions, had been killed in a shootout with police.

“We have had cases of 12 and 13 year olds being used by older criminals,” says the officer. But Ringera regrets that sometimes police officers are forced to watch criminals walk free after posting bail. Usually, they return to the area, warning any potential witnesses of dire consequences should they appear in court to testify against them.

Many witnesses have heeded the warnings, thus forcing the cases to collapse. Inspector General of Police David Kimaiyo recently lamented the high number of cases falling apart countrywide due to the reluctance by witnesses to testify. 

In other instances children related to ‘influential people’ are released after pressure on the police. Some officers have a take-no-prisoners approach.

“It is not unheard of here to bury up to 20 people aged below 25 years in a month,” says Francis Irungu of Huruma’s Ongoza Njia Centre. “Most, if not all these cases are related to crime and it pains us to see the loss of young lives.”

And there is also rising incidences of girls committing crime, some so hardened that they could easily challenge any male novice in the game. The luckier ones end up in rehabilitation schools or in the hands of probation officers. Others, too far gone or trapped in marriages to criminals, have met worse ends.

Ms Florence Mueni, a probation officer in charge of Juvenile Justice at the Ministry of Home Affair’s Probation and Aftercare Services Department says cases of children in conflict with the law are rising.

Mueni recalls ten years ago, when the department would handle about 500 cases. Today, the numbers have tripled. Currently the Probations Department has a load of about 1,300 cases involving boys in conflict with the law and 207 girls.

Carrying guns

Offences that rank highly among children in conflict with the law are stealing, assault, arson, robbery with violence, defilement, rape, prostitution and drug offences, where minors are used in trafficking or preparing and packaging illicit brews and drugs. In more serious cases children have also been charged with murder, manslaughter or aggravated assault.

“The type and intensity of the crimes is rising and they are getting more sophisticated,” says Mueni. “Previously we would have cases of a child stealing chicken or maize. Those involved in violent crime are now carrying guns and would not hesitate to use them,” she says.

Up to 70 per cent of cases among children committed to the Wamumu Rehabilitation School in Kirinyaga County, for example, are there for stealing. It is one of at least a dozen such centres in the country. Children sent to the rehabilitation school, now housing 138 people aged between 12 and 17 have sentences ranging up to a maximum of three years.

“Children are committed to such centres on court orders and usually as a measure of last resort,” says the school’s manager Davenly Mundi. While every attempt is made not to segregate the children based on the crimes they may have committed, Mundi says there is no denying the possibility that children share stories. But following progress of children leaving such centres may not always be easy given that many lie about their identities.

“A child may come into the system, say as Florence, a first born in a family of three whose parents are alive,” says Mueni. “But by the time they are leaving the system they are Jane, who is orphaned and has no siblings.”

This is largely attributed to lack of adequate channels in the juvenile justice system to facilitate information sharing among different agencies. All names have been changed to protect the children’s identities.