A senior police officer who responded to the killing of two suspected robbers by Eastleigh-based cop Ahmed Rashid has testified in court.
Njiru subcounty superintendent of police Lucas Ongaya said on arrival at the scene of crime, he found two bodies on the ground.
A crowd had gathered around the bodies and spent cartridges were next to them. He was told a third suspect had escaped the scene of crime.
Ongaya was testifying against his colleague, Rashid.
He is the third of the 25 witnesses lined by prosecution.
At the time, Ongaya was the OCS Pangani police station where Ahmed was based as night duty officer.
Ahmed, who was the officer in charge of special unit code-named Pangani 9, is accused of killing two people.
Ongaya said on March 31, 2017, he heard a chatter in the police radio in the afternoon.
It said the police had disrupted a robbery and two men were shot in the process. A third suspect had escaped.
Before he could intervene, the court heard that Ongaya was called by his superior, telling him to go to the scene.
He did so and upon arrival at around 3:30pm, he found a crowd.
"I walked through the crowd and found two young men who appeared to have been shot. They were lying about two metres apart and were motionless," Ongaya said.
Near the victims were live bullets, cartridges and a silver homemade pistol.
Ongaya said he was still at the scene when Ahmed walked to him and reported what had been said on the radios.
After assessing the scene, he called the DCI scene of crime personnel who photographed and documented the scene.
They collected the cartridges, a homemade gun and some few bullet heads.
They also checked the bodies for any other evidence but found none.
The Pangani team removed the bodies from the scene and took them to the mortuary where they were marked as unknown because there was no identification.
They then booked a report of the incident under OB No 67 at around 5pm, and sent signals to the head quarters and to the Independent Policing Oversight Authority.
On April 1, 2017, Ongaya said officers from homicide DCI headquarters came to the office and requested to be taken to the crime scene.
They reconstructed the scene and carried out investigations before going back to the station where they collected several items.
Ongaya said they took the homemade pistol, three rounds of 9mm live ammunition, two spent bullet heads, four pieces of fragments, 10 rounds of spent cartridges, OB book of the station with records as of March 3, to April 1, 2017 and the firearms movement register.
On May 8, 2017, the DCI requested Ongaya to hand over firearms including an AK47 which had an empty magazine and two Jericho pistols with empty magazines.
"I was later called to Ipoa to make a statement on December 18, 2019 to make a statement on the shooting," he said.
At Ipoa, Ongaya was showed a clip in relation to the incident where he recognised several officers including one resembling Ahmed Rashid.
The officers were controlling the crowds.
The Superintendent at the time said Pangani 9 was mostly on duty at night between March 25 to April 1, 2017. At times, Ahmed Rashid was also on duty during the day.
Following the conclusion of the examination by the prosecution, the victim's lawyer Elisha Ongoya stood to question the witness.
This however proved difficult as the defence objected to cross-examination.
According to Evidence Act, types of witness examination include examination and cross examination.
The court and litigants could not settle on whether the victim's lawyer ought to cross-examine the witness or not.
Defence lawyer Danstan Omari said victims and prosecution are on the same team but do not share roles. This is to mean that the victim's lawyer cannot be the examination in chief as that is the role of the prosecution.
At the same time, Omari said since both are in the same team, one cannot purport to cross examine as that is the defence's role.
The court adjourned to decide and deliver a ruling on the same, on Thursday morning when defence will cross examine the witness.