After staying in custody for so long, they are finally free to walk home! Justice has been served upon them, but has it been served to the one Sharon Otieno? Well, Migori Governor Okoth Obado’s personal assistant Michael Oyamo and county clerk Caspal Obiero have been released on Sh1 million bail each pending trial over the murder of Rongo University student Sharon Otieno.
Court of Appeal Judges Mohammed Warsame, William Ouko and Otieno Odek gave each an alternative Sh2 million bond and two sureties in similar amount.
Last year, Judge Jessie Lessit of the High Court denied them bail but granted Obado, their co-accused, a Sh5 million bail.
The governor had been in custody for nearly two months.
The two then went to the appellate court claiming that Justice Lessit erred in holding that the prosecution had a strong case against them yet no evidence had been adduced to prove the same.
Obiero argued that the High Court failed to appreciate that the prosecutor’s case was based on circumstantial evidence, hence no compelling reason to deny him bail.
Oyamo maintained that the judge erred by denying him bail, which is his constitutional right when there was no compelling reason to do so.
The two and Obado are jointly charged with the murder of Sharon and her seven-month-old foetus, posthumously named Baby Sharon.
The prosecution has since established that Oyamo plotted the murder of Sharon, his boss’s pregnant ex-lover.
A sworn affidavit by Inspector Clement Mwangi said Oyamo, after plotting the murder, drove to a police station, pretending he had been kidnapped by the very gang hired to kill Sharon.
The affidavit indicates that Oyamo was a calculating planner who used his charm and familiarity with Sharon to lure her and hand her over to the murderers who stabbed her eight times.
The criminals also stabbed her unborn baby – Obado’s son – through Sharon’s back.
Sharon’s body was on September 5, last year, found in a thicket near Kodero forest, Homa Bay. She had been abducted on September 2.