George Kirubi yesterday fought back tears as he recounted his shock when he heard that his wife had been shot and killed.
Mr Kirubi broke down more than once on the witness stand, as he struggled to explain the events of May 20 last year, when his wife Janet Waiyaki was killed at Nairobi’s City Park.
Kirubi looked both weary and agitated. He kept staring at the court walls, the ceiling and sometimes into vacant space. All the while he studiously avoided making eye contact with the policemen who are being tried for his wife’s murder.
Bernard Chege, 26, the survivor of a strange police shooting in which his friend, Ms Janet Waiyaki, was killed, narrated how the two officers ignored his pleas to help save Ms Waiyaki’s life.
The officers, Administration Police Constable William Chirchir from Makadara Police Station and another AP constable, Mr Godfrey Kirui, from Industrial Area Police Station, fired 15 bullets into the vehicle at a popular spot in the city’s Parklands.
What the two officers were doing, allegedly on duty, so far from their beats and in the area under the jurisdiction of Parklands Police Station, remains unexplained.
City Park is a popular hangout where young revellers relax in their cars chewing miraa and drinking especially in the evenings and on weekends. Policemen have been reported to tap on car windows, soliciting for money, before proceeding to the next car.
TRAGIC SUNDAY
On the tragic Sunday morning and out of character, Mr Chege decided to ignore the police, started the car and began to drive off. The two APs opened sustained fire, killing Ms Waiyaki, a mother of three, and leaving Mr Chege in need of blood and nursing injuries at Avenue Park Hospital.
According to Mr Chege they were “relaxing” at the spot he had frequented before the incident.
“I have never been shot before. This is like a movie to me. When I was shot, I tried to apply pressure on the wound. It was very painful. I begged the cops to give me a piece of cloth to stop the bleeding, they didn’t want to help,” Mr Chege said from his hospital bed.
That account differs sharply with that of the police, except for the back-end where police opened fire after Mr Chege refused to open the door and started to drive off.
COMPROMISING SITUATION
Police claim the two were “in a compromising situation” in the car, but Mr Chege says “there is nothing like that”.
Police say they were alerted by Mr Eustace Mureithi, a guard, to the presence of car that had been parked in the same place for hours.
“The officers went and found a Toyota Fielder KBX 515H parked in the forested area with all windows closed.
“They knocked on the tinted windows, but there was no response and all of a sudden, the vehicle sped off towards the road,” the report sent to the police headquarters by Parklands police boss Chief Inspector Moses Shikuku said.
The police report states that the vehicle was shot at by the two officers who had firearms serial numbers 60034428 and 5901067.
“The vehicle then stopped and inside were a male and a female namely Bernard Chege, 26 years old and Janet Wangui Waiyaki aged 41 years. They had gunshot wounds,” the report said.
AVENUE HOSPITAL
The two were taken to Avenue Hospital where the woman was pronounced dead on arrival.After the incident, all six officers involved, including those who did not shoot, had their firearms withdrawn.Nairobi County Police Commander Joseph ole Tito said the car became suspicious after it had stayed in the thicket for too long.
We are not taking chances on security But these officers became overly reactive,” Mr Tito said,
Considering that the officers had opened fire killing an innocent woman and injuring a young man driving his mother’s car, that will likely go down as a major understatement.