• She was lured deep into the hearts of Lenana to capture the story of alleged victim
Image: COURTESY
Media personality Janet Mbugua has narrated how she was conned while on duty.
Speaking on the 'Janjaruka' web series, Lockdown challenge, Janet recalled how she went to the home of an alleged serial killer’s victim in Nairobi’s Lenana area to interview the family about the alleged crime.
Janet was working for a South African media and had come to Kenya for work. "It was in 2010, there was a trending story on Onyancha, who was allegedly a serial killer carrying out some gruesome murders in Nairobi," she said.
"We finally identified a man who said his son was allegedly a victim and we decided and agreed to go but asked to be provided with extra security as we had very expensive equipment with us.
"All I remember is we went deep into the hearts of Lenana to capture his story."
On reaching there, the alleged victim’s father tricked her and her cameraman to trust a group of men that he called in to help offer more security and protection for them and their expensive equipment.
He then went ahead to invite Janet to his home for tea, leaving the cameraman and driver, a group of four people, and they seemed legit.
"It was almost 5pm. The distance where I was going to record was short. I went to the house and got to know the family as I wait for the videographer to come so he films us," she said.
"It took long, 10, 20 minutes and I was like, it's taking long, why hasn't he come back? It is almost 6pm, so I told them, we need to go check what was happening.
"The man who had led us to the house says lemme go check to make sure they are okay. He left the house and 10 minutes later, he ran into the house, saying, 'Wameibiwa! Gari imeenda."
Multi-talented media personality, journalist, actress, author and online influencer Janet Mbugua recalls a time she fell victim to a con artist posing as a victim to a ...
She says she was confused and all of a sudden, she remembered her handbag with her passport were all in the car.
She managed to locate a police officer who helped her go back to the hotel she was living in.
Janet and her cameraman were later that evening reunited with her cameraman with no shoes on, shaken and all their equipment gone!
"Everthing we had filmed in Mombasa was gone with the equipment, worth half a million. We just cried and we could not continue with our work, but we were alive," she said.
“The man we were going to interview is behind this whole thing. He basically set us up!” Janet recalls her cameraman telling him upon his return.
They never got a chance to ascertain if the man’s son was an actual victim to the serial killer’s crime or if the whole thing was a fake set-up from the get-go.
Edited by T Jalio