By Justina Chomba
Efforts by former Icaciri Girls High School Principal Jane Muthoni to blame teachers in Muranga and the larger Central Kenya region for the murder of her husband failed as High Court in Nakuru found her guilty of killing her husband.
After being found to have a case to answer in the murder case of her husband and the then Kiiru Boys High School Principal, Solomon Mwangi, Muthoni concocted a theory that blamed an alleged teachers’ cartel that was jealous of the couple’s progress.
Muthoni had initially been accused with three other people of killing her husband on diverse dates between 6 and 11 November, 2016 at Karakuta Coffee Estate in Juja, Kiambu County.
The others are Isaac Ng’ang’a alias Gikuyu, Joseph Kariuki alias Karis and Nelson Njiru who were procured by Muthoni to eliminate her husband.
However, Njiru went into hiding immediately after the murder incident and is still at large while Kariuki entered into a plea-bargain agreement with the State, confessed into participating in the murder and was convicted to serve a seven year sentence besides being a prosecution witness.
When put on her defence, Muthoni told Nakuru Resident Judge Justice Joel Ngugi that both she and her husband were victims of a “cartel” of Murang’a Head teachers who had threatened to harm them because they refused to be part of them.
She testified that she is highly suspicious that it was one Samuel Karanja who has association with the ‘teachers’ cartel’ who had killed her husband.
In an effort to blame her colleagues in the murder, Muthoni said a car dealer she and her husband had ordered vehicles from was colluding with their occupations rivals to harm the family.
“I and my husband had imported two motor vehicles through Karanja but that after we finished paying the full amount, Karanja refused to deliver and, instead, started threatening us,” she told the court.
Muthoni who has been in confinement for more than four years said that the couple had taken time to investigate the threats and found that members of the out-lawed Mungiki sect had been sent to kill Mwangi so as to get him out of Kiru Boys Secondary School and out of the position of the Head of the Murang’a Head Teachers Association.
Muthoni claimed that they were in disagreement with the teachers’ cartel because it had wanted her husband transferred from Murang’a owing to their young marriage but that the Cartel demanded Sh1 million to facilitate the transfer forcing them to withdraw from the deal.
She narrated how the couple had struggled for more than 13 years to work in the same region to no avail.
“When my husband was eventually posted to Kiiru Boys and I got a slot at Icaciri, the Teachers’ Cartel became enraged because we did not go through them to get the posts and this is what turned out to be the source of our trouble with the cartel,” she said.
She denied the theory that she was suspicious of a love affair between an M-Pesa lady and her husband saying she only had a problem with the said woman because she was being used by the cartel to frame her husband and cause trouble between him and his employer, the Teachers Service Commission (TSC).
“I loved my husband and he loved me too and we had no marital problems whatsoever and the evidence that I suspected him of having an affair with the lady was fabricated,” said Muthoni.
She said the M-Pesa lady who is referred to as MWK in the case due to security reasons was part of the teachers’ Cartel adding she (MWK) disagreed with Mwangi when she tried to persuade him to buy a leaked Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education examination.
The widow claimed that MKW became vengeful and started spreading virulent rumours about Mwangi to the effect that the he had participated in leaking exams and embezzling money from the school through her cyber café.
She also denied ever meeting the accomplices in the murder saying that she has never met Kariuki or Gikuyu.
Delivering the judgment Justice Ngugi dismissed Muthoni’s defense saying evidence given by all the 21 prosecution witnesses including Kariuki who was part of the murder scheme was corroborated.
He said Muthoni was unable to satisfactorily explain the numerous phone and SMS interactions with Njiru which were concentrated on the key dates between November 3 and 7, 2016.
In the matter, it was evidenced by two detectives attached to the two main mobile telephone companies, Safaricom and Airtel that a total of 200 short text messages and phone calls were exchanged between Muthoni and her accomplices.
The Judge noted that 18 messages were exchanged between Muthoni and Njiru in a span of 1 hour on November 4, 2016 on the night that first attempt on killing Mwangi was made.
Muthoni had claimed that it was Mwangi who was using her phone to send the texts because his sim card had been inserted in their laptop to supply a version that was dismissed by the court saying that laptops do not have sim card compartments.
“Further, the incredulity of this explanation is accentuated by the fact that there is absolutely no communication whatsoever between the deceased and Njiru either before or after this alleged intense SMS conversation which involved 18 text messages shared in the space of only slightly more than an hour,” said Ngugi.
During the hearing, the court heard that the initial plan to kill Mwangi was on November 4, 2016 but this did not succeed because the sedative that Muthoni gave him did not take the desired effect.
Kariuki told the court that Muthoni had gone to Kiiru Boys at her husband’s quarter’s with him and Gikuyu hidden at the back seat of a hired vehicle that had tinted windows.
He said Muthoni asked the night guard at the gate not to release the dogs because she was planning on going out later which was a ploy to allow them enter the house without disturbance and later leave with Mwangi’s body in the trunk.
He said the plan was for Muthoni to sedate husband and call them in once he was already weakened to finish him off. He added that she had also bought a rope to be used in strangling Mwangi.
According to the evidence adduced in court, Muthoni bought a stronger sedative meant for veterinary use and drugged the husband with it at her house in Icaciri Girls on November 6, 2016 before delivering her to her killers at Karakuta Coffee Estate in Juja.
As the saying goes, there is no perfect crime, one of the killers carried the evidence with home, Gikuyu left his gumboots at the scene and wore Mwangi’s shoes.
Technology also played a major role in resolving the murder as the call logs placed the culprits together and separately at different locations including the murder scene.
Justice Ngugi said Mwangi’s murder was principally instigated by the Muthoni who procured Gikuyu to execute the homicide pursuant to an agreement where the she promised to pay the two for the killing.
He found that the duo had the malice aforethought as defined by law because they intended to cause the actual death of Mwangi.
Ngugi will sentence the two on May 18 while Njiru, the co-planner remains a fugitive.
