Mistaken identity: Death row convict set free after 10 years

 

A man who was serving a death sentence for violently robbing a taxi driver has been set free after a decade by the Appellate court due to mistaken identity.

In his second appeal, Stanley Njeru Kiragu argued that the public mistakenly arrested him as one of the robbers who had robbed a taxi driver in Naivasha in 2010.

Justices Fatuma Sichale, Lydia Achode and Weldon Korir ruled that from the evidence produced in court, it was clear that the witness who arrested Kiragu did not see him coming out of the vehicle

"In the case before us, Kiragu was arrested after the perpetrators abandoned the subject vehicle and fled on foot," the court said.

"He was then brought to the complainant for identification after being roughed up by the public."

The court said the missing link was the evidence of a witness who saw him coming out of the stolen car and pursued him without losing sight of him till he was nabbed.

"This is important because the complainant did not specify how long he had Kiragu in view at the pick-up point before he entered the car and sat at the back where the complainant could no longer see him," the judges said.

The court said in their view, the evidence created doubt as to whether Kiragu was one of the robbers or a victim of mistaken identity.

"The identification of Kiragu was, therefore, not free from the possibility of error and the benefit of that doubt ought to have gone to him," the court held.

In the case, Kiragu was charged that on November 2, 2010, at the old Kijabe area in Mai Mahiu within Nakuru, jointly with others not before the court, he robbed a taxi driver of one motor vehicle Nissan Sunny Station Wagon valued at Sh500,000 and Sh 6,500 cash.

The driver told police that two men hired him to take them to an IDP camp to pick a certain woman but when they got there, they didn’t get the woman and one person who he claimed was Kiragu volunteered to show them where she had gone.

He further said after about 4 kilometres Kiragu who was sitting behind him suddenly put a rope around his neck and ordered him to stop.

It was during the day that he raised an alarm which made the three robbers run away from the vehicle and that is how Kiragu was arrested a distance away from the scene by members of the public.

However, Kiragu maintained that it was a mistaken identity because he was not found in possession of the stolen items and no eyewitness was called to testify against him.      BY THE STAR