Court sets free a student over murder of a colleague in Mathioya

The Mountain Journal

High Court has set free a secondary school student who five years ago was charged with murder of a female colleague.

Judge Kanyi Kimondo acquitted Phillip Chege Mwangi who had been charged with the murder of Milka Muthoni Wanjiru in March 2017.

In his judgement, Kimondo said from the analysis of the evidence produced at the trial the court cannot be persuaded that the prosecution failed to prove the case.

Chege and Muthoni were students at St Phillips Gikindu Secondary school in Kamacharia in Murang’a County and last spotted on March 28, 2017, walking home from school.

The judge said the directorate of public prosecution produced only two witnesses as the court summons dated October 9, 2018, and October 9, 2019, calling for more witnesses were not acted upon.

“The investigating officer Stanley Mwaura and who recorded the statement from the accused person was in court on October 30, 2017, and did not give evidence,” said the judge.

In the judgement, the judge added that there was no sufficient evidence to place the accused on his defence.

After the deceased failed to return home at 7 pm, a search was conducted in the locality before the body was discovered in a nearby bush and her school bag was found 50 metres away.

In the same court, a man who had been sentenced to serve 10 years in prison on a count of defiling a nine-year-old girl had his sentenced set aside.

Walter Gikonyo was set free after the judge allowed his appeal lodged after he contested a jail term imposed by Kangema Senior Principal Magistrate Peter Kiama.

 The judge ruled that the evidence that was provided by the prosecution was not sufficient to warrant the imprisonment.

“On the totality of the evidence  I have reached to a conclusion that the prosecution did not prove the charge of defilement beyond a reasonable doubt. It must follow as a corollary that the conviction was unsafe,” said the Judge.

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