World 3000m
record holder Daniel Komen has
been charged with six counts of forgery and obtaining money by false pretenses.
Komen, a middle and long distance runner, appeared before Milimani senior resident magistrate Christine Njagi on Monday.
He was accused of fraudulently obtaining a Suzuki Escudo worth Sh1.75 million from Thomas Getanguta.
The athlete allegedly pretended he was in a position to pay for it when he acquired it at Nakumatt Junction on Ngong' Road in Nairobi in 2013.
Komen
faced a second count of forgery for a crime allegedly committed in
September 1, 2015
at an unknown place.
The court heard that he forged a motor vehicle sale agreement for a Suzuki Escudo and told one Nicholas Odhiambo that it was genuine.
He was also charged with
uttering a false document to Cecilia Muthoni at Central police station on the same date.
Komen was further charged with forging an acknowledgement letter for the receipt of Sh780,000 in
December 2014, claiming it was
a genuine acknowledgement of cash received from Odhiambo.
He faced a sixth count of issuing a bad cheque on
May 28, 2014; the court was told he wrote a Sh300,000 cheque from his CFC Stanbic account to Odhiambo, knowing it had insufficient funds.
The runner denied all the charges through his lawyer John Swaka and was freed on Sh500,000 bond or Sh300,000 cash bail.
Swaka had pleaded for reasonable bond terms saying his client was not a flight risk and would abide by all conditions set by the court.
The lawyer further noted that Komen is seeking to be MCA for
Racecourse ward in Eldoret and may have been framed by his political rivals.
He asked for copies of witness statements for the case that will be mentioned on April 26 and heard on May 19.
Komen holds the world record for the indoor and outdoor 3,000m races. The indoor record was set in 1998 (7:24.90) and the outdoor record in 1996 (7:20.67).
With his
7.58.61 world record in the 2-mile race set in 1997, he remains the only man in history to run back-to-back sub-four-minute miles, splitting circa 3:59.4 on both the first and second half of the race.