Court finds Naftali Kinuthia guilty of Ivy Wangeci's murder

Murder suspect Naftali Kinuthia at Eldoret High Court. He has been found guilty of killing Ivy Wangeci. [Peter Ochieng, Standard]

Naftali Kinuthia, the prime suspect in the murder of Moi University medical student Ivy Wangeci is guilty of the student's murder, the High Court has found.

On Thursday, October 26, Justice Stephen Githinji who has been presiding over the trial of the case since 2019, said that the prosecution had proved its case beyond reasonable doubt.

Justice Githinji who is currently based at the Malindi High Court delivered his judgment virtually in a 45-minute session that saw some of the advocates representing the victim's family break down.

The Judge noted that the accused bore malice aforethought and had bought a new axe which he used to end the student's life.

"If he had no intention to kill, he had the opportunity to attack the victim using his bare fist. But he had an axe and a knife and used an axe, a lethal and dangerous weapon, to strike the medical student," the judge stated.

He added: "The accused had a metal axe with a metal handle and claimed that he had it in the car for security reasons. I do not agree with him. I saw the axe in court, it is the one used in villages to chop firewood and cut trees. The accused had denied having a knife. It is laughable when he [Kinuthia] alleges in his defense that a member of the public handed him the knife. Who would want to lose his knife for no reason? This allegation is not true," Githinji noted.

The Judge further stated that Kinuthia did not even use the knife he had to attack Wangeci, noting that a knife would have probably given the deceased a second chance to live.

He poured cold water on the allegations by Kinuthia during his defense hearing that he was intimately involved with Wangeci.

Kinuthia is set to be sentenced on November 22.