Could you imagine that DPP Noordin Haji can be liable of a crime? He has been hardworking in the fight against crime, more so graft, but did you know that someone has accused him of crime? Well, a businessman facing money laundering charges in Mombasa has accused Director of Public Prosecution (DPP) Noordin Haji of threatening him with a gun and stealing Sh2 million from him during a raid at Reef Hotel two years ago.
Stephen Vicker Mangira testified in a Mombasa court that Haji who was then an intelligence officer with the National Intelligence Service and several policemen raided the hotel on claims they were searching for drugs.
In an explosive affidavit filed at the High Court in Mombasa Stephen Vicker Mangira claims Haji exercised illegal powers as an intelligence officer by purporting to arrest and search him without just cause months before becoming DPP last year by.
The businessman told the court Haji threatened him with a gun at Reef Hotel on February 11 2017 when he accompanied police officers on a raid on his car.
Mangira’s lawyer Kinyua Kamunde told the court that Haji, not only broke the law but was also guilty of gross professional misconduct and should not prosecute his client’s case due to conflict of interest.
“I accuse Mr Noordin Haji and Hamisi Salim Masha of jointly stealing Sh2,100,000,” testified Mangira who also added that the future DPP “pointed a gun at my head and conducted a search on my person.”
Mangira has sued the DPP and other state officers including the head of the anti-narcotics unit Dr Hamisi Salim Massa for malicious prosecution and wants Haji blocked from prosecuting him over conflict of interest.
He avers that the DPP cannot, independently, prosecute a matter he was, involved in before getting his current post. But the Attorney General through state counsel Wachira Guyo opposed the application on the grounds that the DPP and Masa cannot be sued in their personal capacities for acts they performed as a state officers acting in good faith.
Meanwhile Mangira testified that Haji, not only snatched car keys from him but also rejected pleas not to touch the vehicles with money and forcefully, opened the car and bags which had money.
The businessman told the court that besides the alleged breaches, police doctored the inventory of goods seized from him to reflect a fraction of the actual money found in the search.
Mangira said on that day police raided Reef Hotel where he was staying with his family, apparently, in search of drugs and according to the initial charge sheet drawn against Mangira and Nabil Loo Mohamed, Bakari Kila Bakari and Lilian Bernard Martin they found 540 grammes of heroin on them.