Five held in Nairobi in connection with theft of Sh30m Ticad summit phones

NAIROBI: Police are holding five suspects for conning a businessman out of 200 mobile phones valued at Sh30 million.

The phones were to be supplied to delegates during the Tokyo International Conference on African Development (Ticad VI) summit, held last month in Nairobi.

The suspects forged documents and conned the businessman, based in Hurlingham, to release the iPhone 6 handsets and ipads days before the summit.

Police were allowed by the court to hold the five until Wednesday in order to complete investigations.

According to police investigations, the suspects used a fake Local Purchase Order with a logo showing it originated from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

They used someone known to the businessman to present the fake LPO to him. They later drove to Harambee Avenue with an agent from Capital Airtime Limited where one of the suspects alighted and walked to Foreign Affairs ministry and Office of the President where he purported to have "connections" to have the documents signed.

He later walked out of the Government premises, saying the person they wanted to see was "out of office". He then made a call, purporting to talk to the said person who confirmed payments would be fast-tracked.

Investigations show Capital Airtime Limited released the gadgets to the group.

The supplier realised it had been conned a week after the summit when they demanded full payment for the gadgets.

Police have since recovered 17 of the gadgets and a hunt for the others is ongoing.

Central DCI William Nanguli said they were looking for more suspects involved in the saga.

Police said they would be charged with forging documents and obtaining goods by false pretences.

A sixth suspect has since been arrested. Police say no LPO bears the logo of a ministry.

"We hope to make more arrests and recoveries. These gadgets are good and can be locked and traced," said an officer in the probe team.