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A trader has accused three police officers of assaulting him. The officers attached to Thika Police Station, on their part, have accused him of obstruction and resisting arrest.
Speaking from his hospital bed yesterday, Ephantus Mwangi from Ngurubani said he had just stopped in Thika town at about 10.30pm on Sunday to drop a friend.
“Just as my friend alighted, I heard someone knocking at my car’s door, ordering me to lower the window. I complied upon realising he was in police uniform,” Mr Mwangi said.
Upon lowering the windscreen, the officer snatched the car’s ignition keys and hounded him out of the car.
“After falling on the tarmac, I heard my right hand bone snapping and felt a sharp pain and pleaded with the officer to stop brutalising me as I had already sustained a broken hand, but in vain,” he said.
BONE SNAPPED
Mwangi said there were three officers and their official vehicle was parked in front of his car.
He said a policewoman who was in the company of the three colleagues kept pleading with them to stop beating him up but they would hear none of it.
Mwangi was later handcuffed and bundled into the police vehicle and booked at Thika Police Station.
But Thika Officer Commanding Police Division Erastus Muthamia exonerated his officers from blame, claiming Gathua provoked them to assault him.
According to Mr Muthamia, the police spotted Mwangi’s car parked under a tree near Thika School for the Blind at around 2am on Sunday night as they were making night patrols and decided to find out what the vehicle was doing there.
“On reaching where the car was, the police officers found a man and a woman. When the policemen knocked at the door, the man came out of the car and bit one of the police officers on his left thumb, occasioning the assault as the police tried to defend themselves,” he said.
The OCPD said the two were arrested and taken to the police station, where they spent the night. The police boss said investigations to ascertain what really transpired had been launched. He did not, however, say whether the police officer who was allegedly bitten by Mwangi sought treatment.
The OCPD also failed to explain how Mwangi put on his clothes considering the officers claimed they arrested Mwangi and the female colleague while naked.
The police version of the story contradicts that of the victim, as Gathua maintained he was arrested in the central business district near a roundabout after dropping a friend.
The police claim he was arrested near Thika School for the Blind and they found him and his female companion having sex.
Mwangi’s car is still being held at Thika Police Station after being towed on Sunday.
The trader dismissed the police version as a cooked-up story to cover up the incident.
He was picked from the Thika police cells on Monday morning after his relatives paid a cash bail of Sh20,000 for allegedly causing obstruction and resisting arrest.
Mwangi had to undergo surgery on Tuesday on his right hand at a private hospital in Mwea.
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