Why circumstantial evidence can't link wife to man's murder

Following the death of her husband, Cecilia Nyaga immediately washed the two knives used to slit the man’s throat, then screamed for help, alleging they were under attack by intruders.

Inexplicably, she stopped people from gaining entry while attempting to rescue her husband from the house. The incident happened in 2018 in Murindiko village of Kirinyaga County.

The late Patrick Njiru, a National Government Constituency Development Fund (NG-CDF) Manager at Kerugoya, was later found naked in a pool of blood in the bedroom, with his neck almost severed from his head.

Njiru was a multi-millionaire businessman with bars and clubs, parcels of land in different towns and high-end vehicles, including a Nissan Shuttle, two Prados, a Mercedes, a Double Cabin and a Toyota Saloon that he bought for his wife, a teacher.

According to Njiru’s brothers, he had four wives and many lovers, a lifestyle that put him at loggerheads with Cecilia, with whom they sired children aged 18, about 15 and nine.

Njiru had expressed fear for his life from unknown persons, including his wife Cecilia, and had acquired a firearm.

During the attack, no valuables were stolen from the house, not even their two phones and the double cabin Toyota and Toyota Saloon parked inside the gated compound whose perimeter wall was 12 feet.

The neighbours who came to rescue them found a 32-inch screen TV, rolls of tissue paper and a 12 kilogramme gas cylinder abandoned inside the compound at the gate.

Cecilia told Njiru’s elder brother Peter Mugendi that the assailants wanted to steal the TV set. However, Njiru’s neighbour, Joseph Muiruri, told the court that for 10 years, there has never been theft in the area.

“The woman did not tell us how many people. She only said they were thieves. Before that day, I had never heard of a theft incident in the area,” said Muiruri.

Cecilia told Inspector Stephen Kibagendi, who was then with the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCIO), that she cleaned the two knives after she found them in the kitchen with blood stains.

She also claimed that she did not run into the house when she saw the assailants entering the compound through the main gate at 9 pm while she was polishing her child’s shoes.

She said she heard some scratches at the main gate and thought that it was their cat struggling to enter at the gate.

Cecilia said the assailants spared raping her after she pleaded with one of them that she was on her unsafe days.

“Whilst polishing the shoes, she saw three men coming from a distance at the main gate and came to the parking yard about 10 metres away. She did not run. The men moved to where she was without talking and one of them got hold of her. He told her not to scream. He moved her to the left side at the kitchen and they started walking behind the house. Whilst on the other side, she said, the man told her they must have sex, and she pleaded, saying she was on her monthly period. He accepted,” Kibangendi told the court in his testimony.

Cecilia recounted that the assailants grabbed her husband’s car keys from the couch and used them to open the car in search of his pistol and later returned the key.

She told police that on the fateful night, her late husband quarrelled with his second wife, Charity Gichura.

Inspector Kibagendi said that he recommended that Cecilia be arrested after concluding that she was involved in the murder of her husband.

She was later charged with the murder of Njiru before being acquitted for lack of evidence.

However, much of Kibagendi’s testimony was regarded as hearsay for failure to record Cecilia’s statement about cleaning the blood-stained knives.

According to Njiru’s brother Mugendi, their marriage was strained, with Cecilia accusing the deceased of having several women.

Mugendi claimed Njiru was planning to abandon Cecilia for Charity, with whom he spent most of the time and introduced her as the second wife.

He said in the course of their marriage, he had solved marital disputes five times and, on all occasions, Cecilia complained about Njiru’s extra-marital affairs.

While acquitting her, Justice Edward Muriithi noted that the case was purely circumstantial as there was no eyewitness to the murder.

The judge said the circumstantial evidence relied on by the prosecution was so weak as to amount to a mere suspicion and cannot be a sound basis upon which the accused can properly be called upon to answer the charge.

He said that mere suspicion, no matter how strong, cannot form a basis for a conviction.

“While a troubled marriage may explain why the accused might harbour resentment towards the deceased and possibly constitute a motive, it does not establish that the accused actually procured, facilitated, or participated in his killing,” argued Justice Muriithi.

He further said that the prosecution’s failure to adduce any digital evidence to establish communication between the accused and the assailants before, during or after the commission of the offence negated the alleged conspiracy to murder the deceased.

“The phones belonging to the accused and the deceased were allegedly forwarded for forensic examination, yet neither was produced before the court,” said Justice Muriithi.