A Kiambu court has discharged a surety from representing a Rwandese National whom he claimed was abusive, uncouth and arrogant.
The Surety, Onesmus Kituku told Kiambu Senior Resident Magistrate (SRM) Ms. Grace Omodho that he wished to be discharged from the case owing to the attitude of the accused who was reportedly not responsive to his calls.
“Whenever he did take the calls on rare occasions, he was very abusive and told me to stop calling him and even said I was disturbing him with many calls” he told the court.
Nsengimana Emmanuel is being sought for by the government of Rwanda through Interpol Kigali. In an affidavit sworn by Inspector of Police Chege Wanjiku on January 24th 2020, the officer told the court that she required time to complete investigations which would enable them to extradite the suspect if the Kenyan police cleared him of any offences he might have committed while in the country.
According to the affidavit, Interpol Nairobi received a complaint from Interpol Kigali, Rwanda on 29/1/2019 that the suspect was wanted for 3 offences of unauthorized access to a computer or computer system data, access to data with the intent to commit an offence and unauthorized modification of computer or computer system data where it was alleged that 307,461,176 Rwandan francs was lost.
At the time of arrest at the Lunga lunga border point enroute to Tanzania, he was also in possession of an expired passport and had no fixed aboard, therefore rendering him a flight risk. It was then that through his Kenyan contacts, he sought the assistance from the surety who now disowned him saying he was unreliable. He was out on a surety bond of 2 million shillings.
His defence counsel Mr. Sammy Bore pleaded with the court to prevail upon the surety to stay on for at least one month saying this will enable his client to get another surety as the police completed their investigations.
He also told court that owing to the prevailing circumstances, it was not possible for the surety to travel out for treatment and that he had only met him that morning, “and I therefore plead for the indulgence of the court to prevail upon the surety”
The case had been mentioned yesterday when the magistrate wondered why it was before her, and Ms Viola Muthoni for the ODPP said the surety intended to withdraw from the case.
“The surety has written a letter intending to withdraw from this case, your honour” It was at this juncture that the magistrate sought to know if he was present in court. He stood up and repeated his intention in English and the magistrate told him “Mzee nieleze kwa Kiswahili ninaelewa”
The surety said he had really suffered to ensure he produces the accused in court since April when he was put on record. I am also sick and I need my title deed so that I could use it to get funds to proceed for treatment out of the country.
I also have information that the accused was planning to run away and I fear losing my property in case he failed to appear in court, he told the magistrate.
It was at this juncture that the magistrate ruled that the court had no mandate to convince a surety to stay on for an accused person if he wished to withdraw from the case.The defense’s efforts to reduce the period for seeking another surety to one week were rejected by the surety and he was discharged and the accused remanded in custody pending the completion of the investigation.
By Lydia Shiloya
