Kinoti, Haji say ruling is start of long battle against Mwilu

The two agencies whose hopes of nailing Deputy Chief Justice Philomena Mwilu were dashed by the High Court yesterday said they were not done with her yet.

Director of Public Prosecutions Noordin Haji and Director of Criminal Investigations George Kinoti said they will appeal the ruling at the Court of Appeal.

The two said they would also pursue the DCJ at the Judicial Service Commission as advised by the five-judge bench that stopped them in their tracks.

“With profound respect, we regret that the court ruled that the DCI had unlawfully obtained some evidence against the petitioner... on the basis of alleged infringement of her privacy. No party advanced any arguments on this point nor did the court invite submissions from any party before reaching its conclusion on this ground,” Haji said in a statement. 

He said they would have provided the evidence to show that they acted lawfully and that they had all relevant warrants, affidavits and court orders to undertake the investigations they undertook. The DPP said this would form the basis of the intended appeal.

“We had all warrants to search her accounts… Not all evidence was obtained from Imperial Bank, some were from the suspects,” Haji said.

Further, the DPP said the court contradicted itself by striking off the interested party’s case on grounds that they could only issue orders concerning matters expressly pleaded in a substantive application.

Yet they went on to introduce the privacy matter which the DCJ had not pleaded.

Kinoti on the other hand termed yesterday's ruling as the start of a journey. He said he was not surprised at the turn of events but vowed to soldier on with attempts to nail the judge.