Wainaina v Republic (Criminal Appeal 96 of 2019) [2025] KECA 1184 (KLR) (4 July 2025) (Judgment)
Neutral citation:
[2025] KECA 1184 (KLR)
Republic of Kenya
Criminal Appeal 96 of 2019
JM Mativo, PM Gachoka & GV Odunga, JJA
July 4, 2025
Between
Samuel Munyiri Wainaina
Appellant
and
Republic
Respondent
(Being an Appeal from the Judgment of the High Court of Kenya at Naivasha (Mwongo, J) delivered on 15th October 2019 in Criminal Appeal No. 20 of 2017
Criminal Appeal 20 of 2017
)
Judgment
1.This is a second appeal lodged by the appellant against the judgement delivered on 15th October 2019 by the High Court at Naivasha (Mwongo, J) in High Court Criminal Appeal No 20 of 2017.That appeal emanated from the judgement of the Chief Magistrate’s Court at Naivasha in Criminal Case No. 1770 of 2015 in which the appellant was charged with and convicted of two counts of robbery with violence. The charges were that on 16th May, 2014 at Rubiri area, Naivasha, jointly with others not before court, being armed with dangerous weapons namely pistols and drugs, he robbed Isaac Muigai Karanja of a motor vehicle reg. no. KBN 175N Mitsubishi Lorry valued at Kshs 4,850,000, a mobile phone and driving licence all totalling Kshs 4,884,000 and immediately before the time of such robbery, used actual violence on the said Isaac Muigai Karanja. He also stole a mobile phone make itel valued T Kshs 5,000 and immediately after the time of such robbery killed Solomon Mwangi Wambui. He was also charged with alternative counts premised on the occurrences of 16th May 2014, in that otherwise than in the course of stealing, he dishonestly retained the said motor vehicle, the property of David Kahora Wainaina and also retained the mobile phone of the late Solomon Mwangi Wambui, valued at Kshs 5,000.
2.The facts of the case were that PW2, Isaac Muigai, who was PW1’s driver had gone to load sand when he met a person who informed him that he had sand which he wanted delivered to High Peak area. They exchanged telephone numbers and the next day, 16th May 2014, as he was delivering the sand which he had loaded the previous day, he received a call from an unidentified number and the caller introduced himself as the person he met the previous day. They agreed that the caller would send a man whose description he gave to show PW2 where to deliver his new order. PW2 consulted with PW1 who agreed to the business.
3.When PW2 was done with the order he was delivering, PW2 together with the turnboy Solomon Mwangi Wambui (deceased) met the man who had been sent by the customer. The man boarded their lorry and directed them a site where they met 3 people including the appellant, standing next to a saloon vehicle. The customer asked PW2 to accompany him to the saloon car to receive payment and he obliged and was given Kshs 20,000/=. Just then, another person came to the car and suddenly, PW2 was waylaid, his phone, car keys, driving licence and Kshs 28,000 taken from him. One of the people had a gun while another had a knife. The deceased was also brought where he was and both of them were forced to ingest water mixed with some tablets. PW2, although blindfolded, feigned drunkenness although he could hear what the people were planning. The turnboy, on the other hand, resisted the drink and was beaten by the assailants, among them the appellant.
4.After throwing PW2 out of the vehicle, the assailants drove off with the lorry. PW2 staggered off and met some masons to whom he explained what had happened and then became unconscious. He later found himself at Naivasha District Hospital. The turn boy however succumbed to the injuries. Later, PW2 attended an identification parade and picked out their attackers, including the appellant.
5.PW1, David Kahora Wainaina, the owner of the lorry, confirmed that on 16th May 2014 he had agreed to his driver, PW2, making a delivery of sand to High Peak Area. They had agreed that PW2 would keep in touch with him. However, after some hours, he called PW2 but PW2 did not pick his call. At about 2.00pm whilst he was having lunch, he received a call from a person who identified himself as the Chief of Mirera Location and informed him that his driver had been drugged and carjacked. PW1 immediately called the vehicle tracking company and then reported the incident at Naivasha Police Station. He also went to Naivasha District Hospital where the driver and loader had been taken in critical condition.
6.Meanwhile, the vehicle was tracked as it was heading to Mau Narok. The police, having been informed, sought assistance from their Nakuru colleagues who intercepted the vehicle and three people - the driver and two occupants - one of whom was the appellant, were arrested.
7.PW3, Chief Inspector Nzioka Singi, who was in charge of the Police Flying Squad in Naivasha, was on 15th May 2014 requested by the Investigating Officer to conduct an identification parade. He kept the complainant behind the Flying Squad office while the parade members were in the corridor near the police cells. He conducted the identification parade as detailed in the Parade Form which was exhibited. The Investigating Officer, PC Satrine Ouma, who gave evidence as PW4 received information from the inspector in charge of Flying Squad that a lorry reg no. KBN 175N Mitsubishi had been robbed and was heading towards Njoro via Nakuru Narok road. Accompanied by his colleagues, they gave chase and spotted it at Mauche area. They intercepted it at a roadblock where the three male occupants, driver David Mwangi Mungai, Samuel Wainaina and Benson Wachira Thairu, were ordered out at gunpoint. Upon conducting a search on them, they found a driving licence, National Identity Card No. 279XXX09, Kshs 100 in a wallet, a wallet and two mobile phones Samsung Duo and Samsung Char.
8.PW6, Sergeant David Makau, who was attached to CID Nakuru North was instructed by the Officer-in-Charge Nakuru Flying Squad to attend to the scene where a hijacked lorry had been intercepted. He proceeded there and took over the matter. According to him, the deceased’s phone make Itel was found in the lorry and all the items found were recorded in an inventory which was exhibited. PW6 also went to Nairobi to the car track company that had traced the lorry from where he obtained a printout of the lorry’s movement on the material day.
9.He stated that the accused persons, however, absconded during their trial and one was gunned down in Nairobi, but the appellant was re-arrested a year later. The other accused, Benson Wachira Thairu, was tried separately in Naivasha Criminal Case Number 963 of 2014. Both PW4 and PW6 identified the appellant as one of the three accused persons they had arrested in the lorry and subsequently charged, before he absconded and was re- arrested.
10.PW5, Nelson Kanyingi, identified the body of his nephew, Solomon Mwangi Wambui, for the purposes of conducting a post mortem examination.
11.After the hearing, the learned trial magistrate found the appellant guilty in the two main counts and sentenced him to death on count I but held the sentence on count II in abeyance as is the usual practice in such matters since one cannot suffer death twice.
12.Dissatisfied with the decision, the appellant appealed to the High Court but his appeal was dismissed in its entirety.
13.Undeterred, the appellant is before this Court on second appeal. When the matter came before us for plenary hearing on 24th March 2025, learned counsel, Mr Alphonse Barrack, appeared for the appellant while learned Senior Assistant Director Public Prosecutions, Mr Omutelema, appeared for the respondent. Both counsel relied entirely on their written submissions.
14.Although the appellant identified 6 grounds as the basis of his appeal, in the submissions filed, the only grounds that were submitted on were that the learned Judge erred: in upholding the appellant’s conviction and sentence when there was no positive identification; in failing to note that crucial witnesses were not called by the prosecution; and in shifting the burden of proof to him yet his defence was reasonable and truthful.
15.It was submitted on his behalf: that the manner in which the appellant was identified, arrested and identification parade conducted was seriously flawed and could not found a conviction; that the appellant was identified by a single witness yet both the trial court and the High Court did not exercise the caution as advised in the case of Abdalla Bin Wendo v R 20 EACA 166; that influenced by an oblique motive, the prosecution failed to call a number of key witnesses to testify such as the chief who relayed the information about the theft of the vehicle to PW1, the masons who PW2 met after being thrown off the vehicle and the medical personnel who treated PW2 at Kijabe Hospital and Naivasha Hospital; that on the authority of Bukenya & Others v Uganda cited in Njoroge v R [2022] KECA 1262, had the said witnesses been called, the court would have been afforded the opportunity to examine the totality of the prosecution’s case and pronounce itself on the insufficiencies therein; that on the authority Kimotho Kiarie v R [1984] eKLR, the appellant’s alibi defence was improperly dismissed; that the appellant was arrested while he was running on hearing gun shots and was then handed over to flying squad officers; that the police effected an indiscriminate arrest absent any evidence that the appellant was either a person of interest or an accused person; that the mere fact that prosecution witnesses gave a contrary account in evidence in itself did not disabuse the appellant’s account of his whereabouts at the time of the commission of the offence, time of arrest and circumstances surrounding the arrest; and that both the trial court and the High Court erred in finding the appellant guilty and convicting him.
16.In opposing the appeal, it was submitted on behalf of the respondent: that the appellant was identified by PW2, PW3 and PW4 under conditions that were favourable for positive identification since the robbery occurred during the day and PW2 had ample time to observe the appellant to enable him identify him; that the identification parade was properly conducted and as was appreciated in Njihia v R [1986] eKLR, it is not difficult to arrange well conducted parades; that both the trial court and the High Court correctly applied the doctrine of recent possession in finding the appellant guilty of the offence of robbery with violence in line with the decision in Wiliam Mika Amasa v R [2020] eKLR and Simon Kanui Mwendwa v R [2020] eKLR; that the appellant gave no explanation on how he obtained the stolen properties which were recovered from him; that the appellant never raised the defence of alibi at an early stage but only in his unsworn statement which limited its probative value and was not corroborated by other independent witnesses contrary to the holding in Erick Otieno Meda v R [2019] eKLR; that on the authority of May v R [1981] KLR 129, unsworn statement has no probative value and that its potential is persuasive rather than evidential and is required to be supported by evidence in the case. We were urged to dismiss the appeal as lacking in merit.
17.We have considered the above submissions. As stated at the beginning of this judgement, this is a second appeal and the law circumscribes the remit of this Court’s jurisdiction by providing in section 361(1) of the Criminal Procedure Code that:
18.By dint of that section, the jurisdiction of this Court on a second appeal is confined to matters of law. Of course, matters of law include the failure by the first appellate court to undertake its mandate of re-evaluating the evidence and subjecting the case to fresh scrutiny. See Jonas Akuno O’kubasu v Republic [2000] eKLR.
19.When it comes to factual contestations, it was held in Stephen M'Irungi & Another v Republic [1982-88] 1 KAR 360 that:
20.Where there are concurrent findings of fact by the two courts below, this court is bound by those findings unless it is shown that they were based on no evidence or where it is demonstrated that the trial court and the first appellate court considered matters they ought not to have considered or that they failed to consider matters they should have considered or that looking at the evidence as a whole they were plainly wrong in their decision, in which case such omission or commission would be treated as matters of law. See Njoroge v Republic [1982] KLR 388 and Karani v R [2010] 1 KLR 73.
21.We are also guided by the decision in Adan Muraguri Mungara v R [2010] KECA 131 (KLR) where it was held thus:
22.In our view, the following issues fall for determination in this appeal: whether the appellant was properly identified; whether crucial witnesses were not called to testify; whether the appellant’s defence was considered; and whether the prosecution proved its case to the required standards.
23.Regarding the identification of the appellant, PW2 was categorical that the appellant was part of the group that he found where he was directed by his client’s emissary who was sent to show him where the vehicle was to be loaded. He was part of the group that grabbed him and robbed him before administering the substance that sent him into unconsciousness. The whole episode took place in broad daylight and he was positive about the identity of the appellant whom he later picked out in an identification parade. PW2’s evidence was corroborated by PW4 who found the appellant in the same vehicle that had been carjacked and in which the identification documents of the deceased were found. In his judgement, the learned trial magistrate stated that:
24.The learned Judge of the High Court, on his part held that:
25.These were two concurrent findings of fact and we can only interfere with them if we are satisfied that there was no evidence to support them. In our analysis, there is no basis for upsetting the findings of the two courts below since they were clearly based on the evidence on record.
26.Regarding the identification parade, it is our view that even if that evidence is discounted, the evidence of PW2 and PW4 is sufficient to place the appellant both at the scene of robbery and thereafter in possession of the vehicle. The appellant in his unsworn statement did not question the manner in which the parade was conducted hence there would be no basis upon which we can, at this stage, fault the manner in which the parade was conducted. We find no merit in this ground.
27.The appellant also took issue with the fact that crucial witnesses such as the masons whom PW2 met after he had been pushed of the vehicle, the chief who relayed the information of the carjacking to PW1 and the medical personnel were not called as witnesses. The starting point when it comes to the number of witnesses to be called by the prosecution is section 143 of the Evidence Act which provides that:
28.This Court dealt with the issue in Suleiman Otieno Aziz v Republic [2017] eKLR and held that:
29.In this case, there is no evidence that the masons whom PW2 came across witnessed the incident. Their evidence, in so far as the robbery was concerned, would have been, at best, hearsay. They would not have added anything to PW2’s evidence. Regarding the Chief, his role in the matter was limited to relaying information to PW1 that his vehicle had been carjacked. Similarly, there is no evidence that he witnessed the robbery. There was sufficient evidence even without his input that PW1’s vehicle was carjacked hence his evidence would not have taken the case a notch higher. Regarding the evidence of medical personnel, the case did not entirely hinge upon the treatment that was administered to PW2. Whereas causing injury to a person is an ingredient in such cases, it is not the only ingredient. In Masaku v Republic [2008] KLR 604, the Court reiterated that:
30.This is not a case where it can be said that the evidence adduced barely established the prosecution case, so that it can be inferred the prosecution withheld witnesses whose evidence, had they been called would have tended to be adverse to the prosecution case.
31.Regarding the appellant’s defence of alibi, it ought to be noted, as was held in the case of Patrick Muriuki Kinyua & another v Republic [2015] KECA 1000 (KLR) that:
32.While the appellant explained that he was amongst the crowd when he was arrested, he did not explain where he was at the time of the robbery. It was the explanation of where he was at the time of the robbery, rather than at the time of his arrest, that would have constituted an alibi defence. Nevertheless, the learned Judge treated his defence as an alibi defence and expressed himself as follows:
33.The appellant did not raise the defence when the prosecution witnesses were giving evidence. It must be noted that the defence case starts during the cross examination of the prosecution witnesses when the defence case is expected to put to those witnesses so that by the time the accused testifies his evidence does not come out as an afterthought. In R. v. Sukha Singh s/o Wazir Singh & Others (1939) 6 EACA 145, the former Court of Appeal for Eastern Africa upheld a decision of the High Court in which it was stated:
34.In Wang’ombe v the Republic [1980] KLR 149, this Court (Madan, Miller and Potter, JJA) held that:
35.Having found that, strictly speaking, the appellant’s defence was not an alibi defence and as the attempt came very late in the day, there is no basis upon which the said ground can succeed.
36.The last ground was whether the prosecution proved its case to the required standards. In this case it was proved that the appellant and his co-attackers were armed and were more than one in number. They used threats on PW2 and even assaulted the deceased with spades leading to his death and stole PW1’s lorry as well as money personal effects of PW2 and the deceased. We are satisfied that all the ingredients of the offence of robbery with violence were proved beyond reasonable doubt.
37.Before we conclude we must comment on the submissions made by the prosecution that an unsworn statement has no probative value. With due respect such a sweeping statement may not entirely correct. In Okumu v Republic [1980] KLR 146, this Court (Miller and Potter, JJ and Simpson, Ag.JA) held that:
38.Similarly, in Amber May v Republic [1979] KLR 38, this Court (Law, Miller and Potter, JJA) was of the view that:
39.Therefore, whereas unsworn statement by an accused, as opposed to the witnesses is not, in the strict sense of the word, evidence, in the sense of sworn evidence that can be cross-examined to, it is “evidence” in the sense that the court can give to it such weight as it thinks fit and should take it into consideration in deciding whether the prosecution have made out their case.
40.Having considered the submissions made in this appeal, we find no merit in it. The appeal is, in those premises, dismissed.
DATED AND DELIVERED AT NAKURU THIS 4TH DAY OF JULY, 2025.J. MATIVO…………………………………………JUDGE OF APPEALM. GACHOKA C.Arb, FCIArb.…………………………………………JUDGE OF APPEALG. V. ODUNGA…………………………………………JUDGE OF APPEALI certify that this is the true copy of the originalsignedDEPUTY REGISTRAR