C*********rs confis**tion of Kariuki’s pa*sports again
Businessman Humphrey Kariuki will not travel to United States (US) and Switzerland for business purposes after a Nairobi court set aside an earlier order releasing his two passports.
Milimani senior principal Magistrate Kennedy Cheruiyot lifted his orders issued on Thursday last week after the prosecution through Catherine Mwaniki informed the court that there are two other existing matters pending in different courts.
The prosecution said if the passports are released it would affect the other cases.
In his ruling Cheruiyot said the application for the release of the passports should now be made in case 1333 of 2019, which is before Chief Magistrate Francis Andayi.
Kariuki was expected to travel to US, Gabon and Switzerland to attend to business engagements between September 23 and 27, 2019, October 27 2019 and between November 26 and December 6, 2019.
Cheruiyot had allowed the release of Kariuki's two Kenyan and Cypriot passports passports to enable him travel to facilitate his travel for urgent business meetings.
The magistrate had ordered the release of the two passports on condition that he deposit an additional surety to the earlier bail terms of Sh 11million cash bail or Sh 20 million as guarantee to ensure he attends court for his tax evasion cases.
He allowed the application saying that the businessman has all through demonstrated willingness to cooperate with investigators, attended court when required and voluntarily presented himself before the Directorate of Criminal Investigation when required.
The magistrate also ruled that in the context of constitutional presumption of innocence, he found no reason why Kariuki’s personal business engagements should be restricted.
But when Kariuki returned to court through lawyer Cecil Miller on Friday, the DPP was ordered to deposit the passports in court on Monday.
However on Monday, the DPP raised the issue of the existence of two other court cases and different bond terms, prompting magistrate Martha Mutuku in whose court the file had been placed to direct that the case be taken before Cheruiyot to issue appropriate orders.
On Tuesday morning, the DPP again raised the issue of the existence of two other cases and urged the court to verify the different bond terms issued in all the cases.
Lawyer Miller objected and urged the court to release the passports to Kariuki and verify that the surety he had obtained was acceptable to the court.
The matter was then adjourned to Tuesday afternoon.
It was after perusing the files before the different courts that Cheruiyot directed that even though the application in which he ruled on had merit hence his earlier order, it should now be made before another court.
Earlier Tuesday in another case before the High Court, Miller had complained about the numerous court cases and orders sought by the prosecution, which are meant to inconvenience and frustrate Kariuki and his companies.
He argued that the criminal matters before the court were all reported on the same day and that all Charge Sheets bear thé same Occurence Book (OB) number.
