By Isaiah Lucheli

A ruling by a High Court judge over the killing of an MP by a police officer at the height of post-election violence in Eldoret came back to trouble him during the vetting exercise.

Court of Appeal Judge David Maraga was taken to task by the Judges and Magistrates Vetting Board over his decision to reduce the charge against the officer who killed Ainamoi MP David Kimutai Too from murder to manslaughter and handing him a less punitive sentence of 10 years.

Maraga was at pains to explain what informed his decision to reduce the capital offence charge yet the legislator and the policeman’s female colleague, who was also shot dead, did not attempt to shoot the accused or attack him.

The board chairman Sharad Rao said according to the evidence adduced in court, the accused had followed the MP and his companion to West Indies estate in Eldoret and shot him inside his car.

“The accused followed the two to West Indies Estate and according to the records David (MP) was not armed and they did not at any time attempt to attack the accused. The issue of self-defence and provocation did not feature anywhere. Don’t you think that this would have been a clear case of murder?” posed Rao.

bribery

The judge was also taken to task over his remarks in his ruling where he wrote that “the accused should have shot the duo on the legs or hand to disarm them, but not on the head and abdomen as the accused had done”.

Maraga defended himself saying the Government had appealed against his ruling and added that he was human after all and was bound to err once in a while.

At the beginning of the exercise, members of the board and the public who had attended the open session were taken aback when Maraga decided to take an oath over claims that he had been involved in bribery.

“In the name of God our heavenly Father and the creator of the universe, I have never taken a bribe and I will never take a bribe,” swore the judge and explained that he was a church elder with Seventh Day Adventist and cited the Third Commandment as his conviction for taking the oath.

He was reacting to a complaint by Law Society of Kenya Rift Valley branch secretary Apolo Mboya, who had accused him of being involved in bribery and tribalism during his tenure as a judge in Nakuru.

Mboya was also taken to task over the allegation he made of bribery and tribalism.

He was asked to state any statistics on corruption or the person who bribed the judge or the agent involved in the alleged bribery.

The judge was accused of taking a bribe in a case of valuation of rating that involved a local authority in Nakuru.

A political aspirant claimed that he met the judge’s agent and facilitated the bribe.