Police Are Now Complicit in Mercy’s Murder

Tuesday, 12 July 2011 14:23 BY MIGUNA MIGUNA

Victim: Mercy Keino

Allow me to revisit the tragic, barbaric murder of Mercy Keino. I do so out of moral and professional duty. We owe it to Mercy, to our children and to society in general to do everything within our powers to find and punish the perpetrators of this most heinous and cowardly crime.
When a cold-blooded criminal takes away the life of an innocent person like Mercy, our silence, fear and lackadaisical attitude encourages the wrongdoer to continue committing more crimes. In Kenya, it is becoming a culture. As a trained barrister and solicitor, one who takes a keen interest on both investigatory and prosecutorial techniques, I would be failing in my responsibility if I shied away from asking tough questions where these haven’t been posed or answered. I am not going to be intimidated, threatened, coerced or soothed into silence by the incompetent, corrupt and docile police.
Before relocating to Kenya in 2007, I had acted for numerous families traumatised by the loss of their loved ones at the hands of the police. I once acted for a family who lost a 24-year-old young man, gunned down at a major downtown Toronto hospital on December 31, 1999 as he sought medical attention for his seriously ill infant baby boy. He was black. The shooters were all white. There was a protracted inquest and false death litigation that I was involved in.
I also represented families whose loved ones had perished in tragic road accidents. Numerous times, I have acted for plaintiffs and defendants in malpractice suits ­ for and against lawyers and physicians. I have had my fair share of reviewing autopsy reports, medical charts and expert reports. I am no stranger to medical, actuarial, engineering, psychiatric and psychological expert reports.
In the past 15 years, I have cross-examined thousands of detectives, police officers, forensic scientists and physicians. I have also read thousands of police reports and notes. Those were a far cry from the patchy verbal narrations by the Kenya Police. So, I know a thing or two about the ‘best practices’ on how to handle crime scenes, how to preserve evidence, and how to detect inconsistencies, contradictions and lies in ‘case files’. When the media first reported on Mercy’s death, my brain went up in flames.
There were so many gaping gaps, questions, contradictions, inconsistencies and plain lies that were flying about. I thought I was watching a horror movie. Yet the police haven’t explained how they resolved them. For without a logical and satisfactory resolution, Mercy’s case must remain open. Criminal cases have no limitation periods!
I am well-trained and experienced in these matters. I have made a living analysing cases and asking relevant questions ­ in and outside the courtroom. And in all my years of legal practice, I have never come across the kind and level of investigative ineptitude and clumsiness that the Kenya Police exhibit daily, but more particularly on the Mercy Keino, Samuel Wanjiru, Njuguna Gitau, Oscar King’ara and Oulu cases. I am also aware of their criminal incompetence on the political assassination cases of Pio Gama Pinto, TJ Mboya, Dr Robert Ouko, Dr Odhiambo Mbai, Father Kaiser, Bishop Alexander Muge and others.
We are told that Mercy had gone to a private party at the Wasini Luxury Homes accompanied by her female cousin. They arrived at the Oil Libya gas station next to The Mall in Westlands. They were met by two men, presumably working for those responsible for ‘arranging’ the private party. Both men closely examined their identity cards and took personal details from them.
Having successfully passed the ‘vetting procedure’, one of the men took Mercy and her cousin in a ‘taxi’ to the apartment and, upon arrival there, they found ‘the second man’ had arrived ahead of them. Like most young women, Mercy carried a handbag and a mobile phone. Please note that detail.
It is almost a given that both Mercy and her cousin carried some money; at least enough for a ride back to the university after the party. The money would most likely have been kept in the handbag as most young women between the ages of 19 and 25 would most likely have dressed in clothes without pockets. It’s most likely that the handbag also contained other ‘normal’ and ‘precious’ items young women carry in their handbags on a night out. An intelligent guess informs me that Mercy considered her handbag very precious. Like most young women, she would have kept it either on the table or on the floor next to her. There’s nothing unusual about that. I’ve done my due diligence and carefully examined the area around Wasini.
The distance between the Oil Libya to Wasini is about 1.4km, give and take. An average person would walk that distance in less than 40 minutes. A taxi would take two minutes from Oil Libya, barring bad traffic.
A direct route from Wasini to Waiyaki Way on Church Road is about 200 metres. A normal person would walk that distance in less than 20 minutes.
However, depending on the level of intoxication, forceful physical restraint or injury, a person might take more than an hour to reach the highway from Wasini on Church Road. There are no streetlights. It’s pitch dark between midnight and 5am on this route.
Because Mercy and her friend had followed the Sarit Centre route earlier, one would have expected her to do the same going back. Human beings are creatures of habit. Moreover, they had been met at Oil Libya earlier on, suggesting that they might have been unfamiliar with the general area. It’s therefore inconceivable that Mercy - whom the Police Commissioner Mathew Iteere claimed was ‘drunk and reckless’ - would have travelled or ran along Church Road in total darkness to her death on the highway alone.
If Mercy was physically unrestrained and she had both her mobile phone and money, she would have either taken a taxi (as they had done earlier) or called a friend or relative to pick her up. The media initially quoted an un-named source at Wasini had called a ‘taxi’ for her. Who was this person?
Has s/he been interviewed by the police? There isn’t any indication if or when the ‘taxi’ arrived at Wasini. If it did, where did it take Mercy and who paid for the ride? Has the ’taxi’ company or driver given a detailed credible account of what happened between the time they were called and the time they arrived at Wasini? Answers to these questions would help unravel how Mercy’s badly mangled body ended up on the highway that morning.
Another undisclosed source claimed that Mercy left Wasini running with a few ‘bodyguards’ chasing after her towards the highway. Who were these men? Who did they work for? Have the police interviewed them? If so, have they clearly explained how Mercy died? More significantly, is that story consistent with Iteere’s scandalous claim that Mercy was ‘drunk and reckless?’ How does anyone who was not at the party speak about Mercy’s recklessness?
The source even claimed that he ‘witnessed’ Mercy being knocked down by a vehicle on Waiyaki Way after 2am. What was he doing in the darkness at that time? Did he contact the police promptly with that information? Has this witness described the men who were chasing Mercy? Have the police arrested those men? If indeed that story is credible, how could Mercy have been ‘run over’ by several vehicles? Couldn’t the ‘witness’ have alerted the motorists of the ‘accident?’ How come the witness never offered assistance and never came forward until the media broke the story?
The police have claimed that alcohol was found in Mercy’s blood. The question is: do the police know how the traces of alcohol got into her blood? Couldn’t the alcohol have been forcefully given to her or injected into her body? Couldn’t her drink have been spiked? Did the toxicology report reveal the presence of other substances? What were their levels? Were the levels of alcohol or other substances (if any) indicative of normal consumption or something sinister? This could easily be determined from examining the liver.
Apparently, Mercy’s handbag and mobile phone were ‘found’ in Wasini after she had been murdered. The police want us to believe that Mercy ‘left behind’ both her mobile phone and handbag. Why? How? No female university student, in fact, no female generally, would have left behind the phone she needed to call for help or assistance.
Usually, a woman won’t leave her handbag behind even when going to the bathroom; more so after the reported altercation with a ‘flamboyant’ Kenyan politician. The only logical explanation why Mercy’s handbag and mobile telephone weren’t found next to her body on the highway was because she didn’t leave the Wasini voluntarily. She was a captive. Her captors knew that with modern technology, one can be traced through a phone. So, they deliberately took it away. But have the police investigated all these angles? Your guess is as good as mine.
 The police have latched on to the incredible story of an ‘Uthiru-bound motorist’ who ‘noticed a woman flagging down vehicles on the highway after 2am’. He allegedly noticed a badly injured woman lying on the same spot where the other woman had been. That’s a bald-faced lie. Why didn’t he stop and offer assistance to her? How would the motorist have seen Mercy’s injuries on the opposite side of the highway in total darkness?
 If he had seen a woman waving down vehicles on his way to Uthiru, it means she had not run into the oncoming traffic as another undisclosed Wasini source had alleged; she would have either been injured or dead already. Why would she be waving down a motorist driving towards Uthiru, anyway? The University of Nairobi-bound vehicles would be driving on the opposite side of the road. Or could it be that she was desperate to catch the eye of a ‘good Samaritan’ because of imminent danger lurking in the dark?
In any event, how did the Uthiru-bound man see the opposite side of the highway after 2am in total darkness on his way back? At that spot, it’s impossible even during the day to notice anything much on the opposite side of the highway, never mind on a virtually unlit road at night. The Church Road side of Waiyaki Way is about 15 feet higher than the opposite side at the point where Mercy’s body was found, at least, and has a barrier, where the traffic comes up on the slip road section between the two carriageways to change direction. In any event, have the police conducted tests at the scene to confirm the Uthiru man’s bizarre story? If so, can they publish those results?
But then, there is a lady who said she saw a motorist dumping Mercy’s body on the highway then driving off. She followed him and wrote down the make, model and the registration number of the vehicle. She then drove to the nearest police station and reported the matter within a few minutes of witnessing the ‘crime’. In countries where police know their job, that’s more than enough to crack the case.
With that piece of evidence, why did the police allow Mercy to be buried within days of her death? Why didn’t the police treat the death as homicide immediately? How come the fake investigations were only ‘conducted’ after the media broke the story?
Perplexingly, the police have latched on to the Uthiru-bound man’s bizarre story and not the lady’s. Ironically, the Uthiru-bound man never reported his bizarre story to the police immediately after he ‘saw the badly injured lady’. He conveniently waited until the media broke the story ­ one week later. Why? Was he planted? Is he a real witness?
Between the two stories, which one sounds more credible and therefore believable? Why shouldn’t the police treat the Uthiru-bound man as a potential suspect?
There is another peculiar detail: When Mercy’s body was found on the road, there was not much blood at the scene. Why? If Mercy was a victim of a ‘hit-and-run’ and her body badly mangled as a result, as the corrupt and incompetent police want us to believe, why wasn’t the scene messy with blood? The police said Mercy’s skull had no brain; did they find parts of her brain on the road? If not, why? Isn’t it possible that the body was mutilated elsewhere before being dumped on the highway? Isn’t it also possible that the murderers are the same people who repeatedly ran over Mercy’s body after dumping it on the highway? Why didn’t the police visit the scene immediately after the report by the lady? On what basis have they latched on to the hit-and-run concoction?
 Why haven’t the police thoroughly investigated everyone at the party, including the ‘boss’, cooks, waiters, watchmen and security people? How about the drug-dealing angle? What happened to the CCTV cameras? Have those been investigated? Why not? We want to know.
 The Kenya Police have become unacceptably inept and corrupt. In the Samuel Wanjiru case, the police have refused to investigate a credible story linking the deceased’s wife to a senior police officer in Nyahururu. They have refused to disclose who were in the Toyota Prado that arrived at the Wanjiru compound with Teresia Njeri that fateful night. They haven’t released the autopsy report and explained what caused the fatal blow to the back of Wanjiru’s head if he had jumped from the balcony as the police have alleged.
 These are questions I would have asked, had I been involved as a lawyer in this case and other cases. And the police must answer them to our satisfaction instead of expecting us to swallow their garbage. We aren’t total idiots!

Miguna is the PM’s advisor on coalition affairs. The views expressed here are his own.