If officer’s rifle did not fire bullets, whose gun did?

John Oywa

I was on duty in Kisumu as bureau chief that chilly morning when a member of the KTN crew covering the post-election violence placed a distress call.

He had just recorded a spine chilling murder of two unarmed youths by a lone policeman and a senior officer keen on destroying evidence was trying to confiscate his camera. I advised him to jump on the next available boda boda and take a panya route to the office.

Five minutes later, he arrived safely, panting for breath with his camera tucked under his jacket.

When the exclusive footage rolled on television sets at 1:00 pm that day, the nation was stunned. Kenyans saw a helmeted police officer opening fire on the two youths near the post office at Kondele.

Soon after the news flash, a senior police officer called me asking for the tape. I refused and referred him to my senior editors in Nairobi. He wanted to know the identity of the cameraman who shot the historic footage but I again referred him to my seniors.

I am revisiting the incident because like other Kenyans, I am stunned at the High Court decision to acquit a police officer charged with the murder of the two young men — Ismael Chacha and William Onyango that fateful morning on January 16, 2008.

I am puzzled because police in Kisumu had started investigating the killings soon after the story was aired on television. They visited our office more than twice seeking to speak to our journalists. This means the investigations started fairly early and ought to have left no stone unturned as authorities often tell us.

I am shocked at the turn of events because the investigations in the shooting ought to have been a straightforward matter. The offence was committed in broad daylight.

Sleuths at the CID headquarters viewed the footage and questioned several people. They must have spoken to senior officers at Kisumu’s central and Kondele police stations. These officers must have held the secrets of the killings because they saw the killer in action. They must have known him because they had a list of which policeman had which gun on that fateful day.

High Court judge Justice Fred Ochieng’ acquitted the accused, Constable Edward Kirui because of a disparity in prosecution evidence that he confessed also appalled him.

The judge who took over the case after Justice Onesmus Mutungi who originally handled the case, said there was a mismatch in the serial numbers of a gun used in the killings.

Arrested and disarmed

It turned out that Kirui’s AK-47 rifle serial number 23008378 was different from a similar from a gun number 3008378 that was examined and identified as having been used to shoot the two victims.

It is on record that Kirui was quickly arrested and disarmed by his immediate boss at Kondele Police Station after the shooting. Then things started going wrong. The gun taken to the ballistic experts for examination was no 3008378. Who changed the guns and why?

Whatever the case, senior police officers in Kisumu knew the officer who committed the crime. Why did the officer commanding Kondele police station arrest Kirui if he was not involved in the killing? If he was innocent then who was that trigger-happy policeman seen on the KTN footage? Well, Kirui is off the hook but which officer used the mysterious gun No 3008378?

His name must be in the list at Kondele Police Station. Now that the court has ruled that Kirui’s gun No 23008378 did not discharge the killer bullets can they arrest the officer who carried gun No 3008378 that day?

Did I not hear some politicians say that Kenya cannot take post-election violence suspects to The Hague because we are not a failed State?

How do we convince the world otherwise when the very officers expected to fight impunity have failed a simple test?

The writer is a senior special projects reporter with The Standard.