Police take Jowi round city in search of weapon

Joseph Kuria Irungu alias Jowie. [Kamau Maichuhie, Standard]

Police are yet to recover the weapon — believed to be a knife — that was used in the murder of Monica Kimani in Nairobi’s Kilimani area more than two weeks ago.

As part of efforts to get the weapon, detectives took with them Joseph Irungu, a key suspect in the probe, to the scene of crime and back to the route that TV journalist Jacque Maribe’s saloon car he used was captured on the fateful night. The team also drove back to the Royal Park estate where Irungu and Maribe lived.

The officers from the homicide unit later went with Irungu to three estates said to be his friends’ residences.

They also hoped some of the suspects in custody would disclose where the weapon and keys to Monica’s apartment may have been thrown or placed. However, by last evening the officers had not recovered the weapon.

Meanwhile, a man whose identity card was left at the security desk of the apartment block where the body of Monica was found spoke to police.

Dominic Bisela, a guard working with Lavington Security, was arrested after it emerged that his ID was used to access Lamuria Gardens on the day Monica, 28, was killed.

Mr Bisela told police he had visited a construction site in Royal Park estate, Lang’ata, as a casual worker.

Maribe, her fiancé Irungu and neighbour Brian Kasaine, who has also been arrested in connection with the Monica’s murder, lived in the Royal Park estate. Bisela had been off duty from September 15, four days before Monica’s body was found.

At the construction site, he and other workers surrendered their IDs at the gate to the site guard.

According to police, Bisela said before he left the site the guards told him his ID was missing. He told police he asked the guards to call him when they found it.

Bisela was, however, shocked when he was arrested from his Kibera home and told his ID had been used to access Lamuria Gardens on the night Monica was killed.

Guards at the construction site at Royal Park estate were yesterday questioned on the circumstances under which the ID went missing.

The Lamuria Apartment guards had told police the man who signed in with Bisela’s ID wore a kanzu, jacket, and cap that covered his eyes.

According to police, a partly burnt piece of a kanzu and jacket were recovered in a compound at the Royal Park estate.

Police, in an affidavit, said the Lamuria guards and other witnesses have since identified Irungu as the man who signed into the compound using Bisela’s ID, which has not been recovered.

Irungu is expected in court tomorrow to take plea after the expiry of 10 days granted to police to allow them to conclude investigations.

Detectives said has Irungu’s phones analysis and was yesterday reaching out for clarification from individuals they termed as persons of interest.

They said Irungu would be charged with murder and bearing false witness. Kasaine, too, will be charged with being an accomplice to a murder and illegal possession of a firearm.