Why police freed suspect in the mystery shooting of NHIF staff

NHIF staffer Mary Lilian Waithera. She died at the Nairobi CBD on Monday, February 13, 2023. [Courtesy, Kamore Maina]

The businessman arrested in the ongoing investigations into the killing of NHIF employee Mary Waithera has been released.

In has also emerged that the businessman, picked up at his home in Kenol, Murang'a, last Monday, did not spend a night in police custody.

This, after ballistic examination on his firearm revealed that his licensed pistol did not fire the bullet that killed Waithera.

This latest development has come as a setback to the investigators who are tasked to, among other things; find the killers of Waithera or the motive of the shooting and recover the weapon used.

So how did the 38-year-old businessman find himself at the centre of the murder probe?

Sources within the DCI familiar with the probe told The Standard police were tipped about the businessman by members of the public who had spotted him with a firearm on the day Waithera was shot dead.

He allegedly had been seen with a gun inside a car on the same street the employee was shot.

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The investigators from Nairobi Central DCI trailed the businessman to his rural village and brought to DCI headquarters for further questioning.

The trader, according to the sources, denied shooting Waithera but admitted that he was inside a car that was parked close to the scene of the shooting.

Using mobile phone forensics, the police were able to place the businessman at the scene of the shooting where he spent close to five hours the same day.

The businessman explained that on the fateful day, he was using a friend's car as he waited for his mechanic to deliver his vehicle which was being fixed at a garage.

Police also questioned the trader about why he had accessed the building from where the killer bullet is said to have been fired. The businessman said he was visiting a friend who works at an office in the same building.

But what saved the businessman was ballistic evidence which showed that his firearm was not used in the shooting.

"We have no reason to detain the man after the ballistic report revealed that the weapon recovered was not the one used in the shooting," said an official familiar with the investigations.

A new investigations team from the DCI Homicide unit has since taken over the investigations following a directive by DCI boss Mohammed Amin on Tuesday.

The latest finding has sent the investigators back to the drawing board.

Waithera and her colleagues were walking along Kaunda Street on February 13 , when she complained of a sharp pain and collapsed.

A bullet was found in her lung during a postmortem examination.

On Friday, forensic investigators from the DCI headquarters provided the Central Police investigators with a preliminary report about where the killer bullet could have been fired from.

Earlier police recovered CCTV footage from the area of the shooting revealing the last moments of Waithera.

Damaris Achieng', a colleague who had accompanied Waithera from their office in Upper Hill to town, has also recorded a statement with the investigators.

She said she saw Waithera, who was walking ahead of her, holding her left side.

She thought her colleague had suffered a heart attack and pulled her to the pavement. She started making calls to find transport to rush her to rush her to hospital. CCTV footage that captured Waithera's last moments show her slowly bending over after the bullet hit her.

She held on to her handbag while trying to support herself.

All the while, not many people on the busy street had realised what had happened.