Court told why jilted woman threatened to kill Sharon Otieno

Senior state Prosecutor Catherine Mwaniki (standing ) presents her submission  at a Milimani court on Tuesday,July 13,2021 when a case where former governor Okoth Obado is charged with the killing of a university student Sharon Otieno. [Collins Kweyu, Standard]

A forensic investigator has told the court that murdered university student Sharon Otieno was threatened by a jilted woman days before she was killed.

Chief Inspector Ezekiel Ade testified that the unidentified woman warned Sharon to stop an affair with her husband failure to which she would harm her.

The investigator however said they did not investigate who the woman was or the husband she was talking about despite having the phone numbers they used to communicate with Sharon.

“The messages were clearly a threat to the deceased but we did not know the owner of the numbers or the registered users. It was possible for the investigators to identify who owned the numbers but they did not establish that,” said Ade.

The investigator was testifying in the case where former Migori governor Okoth Obado, former personal assistant Michael Oyamo and former county clerk Caspal Obiero are charged with the murder of Sharon and her unborn baby on September 3, 2018.

He said on September 9, 2018, he received a request from homicide detectives for forensic analysis of Sharon’s phone as well as those seized from Obado and his co-accused.

From the analysis of Sharon’s phone he extracted the text messages from another man who she was allegedly dating and the texts from the man’s wife warning her to keep off.

In the first message, the woman warned Sharon stating “Please leave my husband alone. I have gotten your number finally. I have to look for you and fight you till the bitter end. I have to do to you the worst I can irrespective of the cost it will take. You will not walk away with it.”

The woman sent another message pleading with Sharon to leave her husband and that she had set in motion an action plan to punish her for going out with the husband.

According to the extracted text messages, Sharon had admitted to dating the man but that she knew the man was single. She told the woman to be honest and tell her about the man so that she walks away.

The unidentified woman however continued with the threats, which made Sharon dare her. “It seems you are used to doing bad things to people because that is what you are for real. Just do your worse but remember there is judgment day. You will do them and get away with it but one day you will pay for all your evil deeds,” read the message from Sharon’s response.

The investigator testified that from the context of the messages, Sharon was under threat over someone’s husband.

Asked whether Sharon had received a similar threatening message from Obado or any of the accused persons, the investigator said he did not find any such message.

“It was possible for investigators to establish who the snatched husband was and the agitated wife through liaison with mobile service providers. The person should have been of interest because of the threats but they were not identified,” said Ade.