A former chief in Nairobi and officials of Sowesawa Self-Help Group will be charged afresh with forgery in March after they failed to attend court virtually on Tuesday.
They were expected to be charged afresh with forging ownership documents for Sh944 million land in Donholm belonging to Gidjoy Investments Limited.
Alexander Hoops (the former administrator), Patrobas Owino, Peter Gitau Muiruri and Peter Njoroge Kanika had been charged with using fake documents and fronting themselves as a self-help group with intent to apply political pressure to be allotted the land or to invade and occupy it.
They were also accused of using fake allocation letters/title documents that could not be supported by any records at the Lands Registry.
The suspects were first charged in 2018 in separate suits, but the courts agreed with the prosecution and the defence on the need to consolidate the cases as they were handling similar matters.
When the four cases were mentioned on Tuesday before Milimani chief magistrate Francis Andayi, Owino, through his lawyer, told Andayi he was unable to attend court.
"The accused person is not before Court. I called his brother who told me that Owino had travelled upcountry to attend to his sick wife. His brother said Owino had lost his phone,” the lawyer said.
The lawyer for Njoroge and Gitau said his two clients had challenges logging in to the virtual court.
"I seem to have lost my clients on this platform. I can’t get them on the phone. They have informed me that they are in Donholm," he said.
Hoops was also not in court and neither was his lawyer, but the DPP, through Angela Fuchaka, said he had informed the investigating officer to summon him.
"I spoke to Gilbert Okello of the DCI land fraud who said he had informed the suspect to log in virtually. However, I can't see him on the platform,” Fuchaka said.
Andayi gave a stern warning to the accused persons for failing to attend virtual court sessions and directed them to appear in open court on March 2 for consolidation of the four cases and plea taking. The case will be mentioned on March 2.
In the charge sheet, the DPP has provided documents to show that the suspects fraudulently prepared title documents in attempt to illegally acquire the property.
The activities of the self-styled self-help group was first exposed by the National Land Commission in a report to Buruburu OCPD in April 2018, when it disowned 'NLC resolutions' purporting to award prime parcels of land to self-help groups in Nairobi.
The NLC had dismissed the letters, on whose strength two self-help groups were claiming land ownership, as forgeries.
