Former KTN, NTV journalist and wife charged over Ksh1.17 billion Syokimau land fraud

A former KTN and NTV journalist and his wife have been charged with 12 counts linked to a fraudulent land deal in Syokimau. 

The couple appeared before the Mavoko Law Courts this week, where they denied all the charges read out to them.

At the center of the case is a 3.775-hectare parcel of land valued at a staggering Ksh1.176 billion, a property that legally belongs to a logistics firm now entangled in a messy legal battle.

Prosecutors allege the couple conspired to unlawfully grab ownership of the land through an elaborate paper trail of forged documents, including a fake title deed, a falsified grant, and a fabricated deed plan meant to mislead land registry officials.

The prosecution says the pair forged the signatures of senior officials from the Lands and Survey departments, thereby giving fraudulent registrations a semblance of legitimacy before detectives eventually caught up with them.

The Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) established that the couple operated through a firm in which both the journalist and his wife serve as directors through this entity, and the alleged scheme to seize the disputed Syokimau property was executed.

The veteran journalist faces two extra counts of uttering forged documents, stemming from allegations that he presented the disputed land papers to detectives at the DCI headquarters in June, fully aware they were fake.

Through their legal representation, the couple asked the court for lenient bond terms, citing that a minor child had been left unattended at home after they went to record statements and ended up detained instead.

After pleading not guilty to all 12 counts, the defence team renewed its push for the couple to be released on bond. 

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Resident Magistrate Faith Boit did not rule immediately on the application; instead, she directed probation officers to compile pre-bail reports assessing whether the accused persons are suitable candidates for release. 

The case is set to be mentioned again on July 9, when the court will review the pre-bail reports.  

The journalist built his career as an investigative and mainstream print journalist, primarily at Nation Media Group’s Daily Nation, where he focused on land transactions, public administration, and human-interest reporting.

In 1998, he authored a highly publicised human-interest story about a man who claimed to have milked an elephant, a story that made him receive a Ksh2 million slapsuit.

In his later years tied to the media, the veteran journalist leveraged his investigative background to publicly challenge government administration and land governance issues. He became known for taking his fight beyond the newsroom and into public institutions.

In 2017, he petitioned Parliament and media outlets to remove then National Land Commission (NLC) chairman Muhammad Swazuri, alleging corruption and citing a Ksh86 million compensation dispute involving land his company claimed to own.

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