A High Court judge is facing a battle to save his job after a petition was filed before the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) asking for his removal on grounds of gross misconduct and incompetence over his handling of a widow’s succession dispute.
In a cocktail of bribery allegations, conflict of interest and abuse of office claims, the petition includes several audio and video recordings of the judge, a person said to be a close relative and several people involved in the case discussing how to scuttle the appeal that the widow had filed.
The Sunday Nation cannot name the judge at this stage for legal reasons. He did not respond to our phone calls and text messages yesterday. According to the affidavits attached to the petition, the videos and audio were recorded between July 1 and 10.
“From the surrounding circumstances, it is evident the judge was involved in fraud and is, therefore, unfit to continue being in office. I pray that the Judicial Service Commission considers this petition and forwards the same to His Excellency the President in accordance with the provisions of Article 168(4) of the Constitution,” the widow pleads in the petition.
The video clips were secretly shot reportedly at the judge’s house located along Waiyaki Way by individuals who posed as land agents. The judge is among those who were recently interviewed for the positions of Chief Justice and judge of the Supreme Court. He has previously had other allegations against him.
Discuss bribes
With his back to a television set, the judge proceeds to discuss bribes in one of the clips submitted to JSC. A plate of boiled maize is served and those in the meeting pick a cob each.
Another video clip apparently shows the judge and the man said to be his close relative talking of acting as intermediaries for bribing other judges. In some of the clips, they drop names of some of the judges they have allegedly delivered money to influence their decisions.
The petition was filed with the JSC on September 3, together with the video and audio clips that accompanied the petition as evidence of the judge’s misconduct.
It is not clear if the judge has been served with the petition.
“Usually we serve it only after we have placed it before the commission. But what I know right now that has not happened,” the Chief Registrar of the Judiciary Anne Amadi told the Sunday Nation.
The widow and a second petitioner accuse the judge of presiding over the succession dispute when he personally had an interest in the piece of land in Kwale County which was at the centre of the dispute. The land was in the name of a company in which both the widow and the deceased husband held shares. However, the husband transferred his shares to the widow before he died in 2014.
Almost a year after his death, a different woman applied for a letter of administration of the property of the deceased and was duly granted in 2015. In granting the letter of administration, the court also transferred the piece of land that was in the name of the widow’s company, leading her to challenge the decision.
The challenge was handled by this particular judge who has now been accused of gross misconduct and incompetence. The judge dismissed the widow’s challenge.
“In so doing, the learned judge disregarded the glaring evidence of the ownership of the property and overlooked a basic concept of law on separate legal personality insisting on distributing the property to the respondent when the deceased did not own the suit property itself,” the petition states.
And the allegations get more interesting from here as the widow alleges that while the succession case was continuing before the judge, the property in dispute was transferred and registered in the name of the judge’s brother.
In one of the taped audio recordings of a telephone conversation allegedly with the judge’s brother, he (the brother) says that while the property is registered in his name, he is a proxy for the judge. It would mean that the judge presided on a matter in which he had direct interest. The brother also allegedly says that the judge intended to sell the property at Sh305 million.
“The judge had schemed to own the suit property and was only hearing us as a procedural step,” the petition states.
Property now
In the video clips accompanying the petition, the judge also supposedly confirms that the property now belongs to him. In the clips before JSC, he proceeds to advise the people he was meeting how to terminate an appeal the widow had lodged at the Court of Appeal by convincing the widow to enter consent for withdrawal and be paid Sh65 million. There is an urgency in his voice as he instructs the people he is with to get the consent on a Monday “so that we can be done with this thing by Thursday.” It is not clear what dates he was referring to.
“I think for me it is as good as done,” the judge can be heard saying. The judge can be heard in the video clip saying that he will “control” the appeal which will not go anywhere. The appeal was lodged in 2018 and hearing concluded.
The court was to deliver its judgment on February 27, 2020 but has yet to do so more than a year later. “The judge uses and has been using (name withheld) as his agent and/or proxy in his corrupt dealings,” the widows avers.
In one of the clips, the judge and the close relative boast of how they have carried a lot of money to bribe other judges. In one instance, the close relative says the judge reportedly gave him $40,000 (approximately Sh4 million) in cash to deliver to an aide of another judge.
In another instance, he narrates an incidence in which a judge had allegedly accepted to take money but did not deliver the decision as they had agreed. The judge purportedly refunded the money which he says he returned to the party. BY DAILY NATION