Police 'recover car used in George Muchai killing' as women recall ordeal

Kenya: Police have seized a car reportedly used by hooded gunmen during the killings of Kabete MP George Muchai, his two bodyguards and a driver.

The white Toyota Spacio belongs to a female insurance executive, police said, but it emerged that they released the car without subjecting it to a thorough forensic analysis.

The woman told police she was carjacked and abandoned at Kamandura on the Narok-Nairobi highway hours after Muchai and his aides were killed. She, together with a female passenger, were questioned on Monday and yesterday.

Apart from the women, more than 10 people including witnesses of the attack have been questioned. They include two street children who witnessed it, Muchai's family and attendants at the bar where he was before his death.

The women said they spent almost six hours in the car's boot and they at one point heard gunshots at unspecified place within the city. Police have concluded the gunshots were at the murder scene.

And senior police officers at Kikuyu police station are now under investigation after they released the car to the owner on Sunday without conducting a thorough forensic analysis. This, police said, led to loss of evidence through fingerprints being erased which could have helped identify the killers.

The officers reportedly took brief statements from the women and released the car to them without dusting it, after the victims told them they were not interested in pursuing the case because they had recovered the vehicle. The car was later picked up by police from its owner on Monday evening after witnesses at the shooting incident said the vehicle used by the attackers resembled a Probox and was white.

According to the women, four hooded gunmen who had an AK47 rifle and three pistols attacked them in Gachie, Kiambu, as they drove home on Friday at about 10pm. The gang took over the car before bundling them into the boot.

Bought drinks

They told police they, at one point, drove up to a club at Parklands where one of the gunmen walked and came back with drinks. From there, they drove towards Kikuyu and later headed back to Westlands. On Waiyaki Way, the gang tried to block a BMW but failed after the driver made a wrong turn and escaped, said one of the women.

"The women say they think the gang wanted a powerful car to use in their mission but could not get the BMW after the driver managed to escape," said an officer aware of the probe.

At one point, the women said they heard the gang argue in their Kikuyu dialect on why their gang leader agreed to take half of the fee for their mission. Later, they told police, the gang drove at a high speed possibly in pursuit of a car before they heard gunshots after the vehicle stopped in the city centre.

 

The women said they were robbed of mobile phones and Sh100. The mobile phones were yet to be used by yesterday. The car then sped off to Kimandura where they were abandoned at about 4am. Director of Criminal Investigations Ndegwa Muhoro said yesterday they were making good progress in the case.

"We are yet to know the motive but we may know the killers. We have the car that was used in the attack," said Muhoro.

Muchai, police constables Samuel Lekakeny Montata and Samuel Kimathi Kairingia and driver Stephen Ituu Wambugu were killed on Saturday at around 2.50am.

Meanwhile, The Standard confirmed yesterday that Galileo's Lounge, where the late MP was spotted making merry the night before he died, remains shut on Sundays and Mondays and has done so for the last eight years.