I once earned millions of shillings from one job but today have nothing

At the age of 10, Elias Hiti Mwaganu dropped out of school in Standard Two “due to an urge to be rebellious”.

Incensed by his action, his father gave him an ultimatum: he could  continue living  at home only if he went back to school. Mwaganu wanted nothing more to do with school so he left home. “I went to Thika Town, where I became an urchin. I got a job in a backstreet eatery, earning Sh5 a month,” he says.

One day a customer with a bicycle ordered chapati and beans, which cost Sh25. “He gave me Sh500 to settle his bill. I told him we didn’t have any loose money and suggested that he lend me his bicycle to go and get change from a nearby beer depot,” Mwaganu recalls.

He disappeared with the cash and the bicycle and moved to Free Area just  outside Nakuru Town.

“I resumed my street life and within a month, I was in Kisii Town. I bumped into an aunt who took me in. She called home and was told about my rebellious ways, including how I had stolen from my employer and a customer. She called the police…” he says.

But luck was on his side. There was no police transport to take him to  Thika where he had committed the crime, so after two weeks in custody, he was released.

His mother went for him in Kisii, but all efforts to get him back to school failed.

Then, in December 1995, Mwaganu  met a teenager from his Gitiri Village in Murang’a County who had come visiting. .

“He told me that real men don’t live in the village, that he could take me to Nairobi and introduce me to employers. He told me real men make money, have many wives, drink alcohol and eat lots of roasted meat. I was immediately interested,” he recalls.

CLOSE SHAVE

That is how, at the age of 13, he found himself living in Umoja Estate in Nairobi, with five gangsters.

“My village mate showed me the ropes. He taught me how to use small arms. My first training was how to fire a berretta pistol,” he says. Thereafter, he would accompany his colleagues on missions.

“My total worth at that time was about Sh200,000. I was living large. That was life, only fools were in school…,” he says.

In March 1996, their ringleader told them that the wife of a man who would be taking Sh9 million to the bank wanted that cash snatched; she was ready to pay them Sh5 million. They were elated and prepared for the assignment.

“Using a stolen pick-up, we blocked his car in Donholm. I had a pistol, while another colleague armed with an AK47 covered us. We took the cash but I didn’t get even a cent. Two of our colleagues ran away with it,” he recalls.

In 1997, he joined another gang.  This time they got information from a bank that a man who was taking his son to the Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT) had Sh3 million in cash.

“But the man was smart. He had police escort and when we swung into action at the JKUAT gates, the plainclothes officers opened. We were lucky to escape but a male student caught in the crossfire died instantly,” he recalls.

In 2001, when he was 19 years old, Mwaganu had his own gang of six. “I had six firearms for our use, which I also leased to other gangs. Once, I got wind of a harambee in aid of a kidney patient in Dandora. Sh1.5 million had been raised. That was good money so we decided to go for it,” he says.

“We arrived and immediately swung into action. But in our haste, we had not imagined that there might be armed security on guard. I was ordering everyone in the hall to lie down as I fired a warning shot in the air when all hell broke loose. Two bullets whizzed close past my head. Another grazed my thigh. How I escaped is not important; the important thing is that I was the only one who survived,” he says.

He started living on the run because  the police were hunting him down. “I don’t know how they traced my village, but my parents and siblings lived in constant fear of police raids,” he says.

SETTLING DOWN

In 2004, with loads of cash and eager to spend, he met Janet Mwende, a young woman who had come to Nairobi  to look for a job, in a bar in Ruai on the outskirts of Nairobi.

“I had Sh3 million from a successful job.  I heard her asking whether there was a job vacancy in that bar and replied that there was,” he recalls.

He invited her for an “interview” and ended up giving her Sh100,000 as advance pay for a non-existent job.

“I coaxed her to taste alcohol and she got very drunk. I went with her up to my room in that bar. When she woke up the following day, she was my wife, and still is,” he says.  They have three children aged between five and 11.

“By 2008 she had tired  of my lifestyle of renting at least five houses and ordering her to move from one to another at short notice. She told me to take her to my rural home so that she could settle down with our two children. She even told me she knew I was a gangster and that I risked leaving her a widow with no permanent abode. She wanted me to either invest or quit crime,” he says.  “She made sense, only that she did not know that the proceeds from crime are shared a huge network of people.”.

In 2010, his mother, Elizabeth Muthoni, died of high blood pressure. “Deep down I knew I was the cause.  My criminal life was a poorly kept secret in the village because of the frequent police raids on my father’s compound in search of me,” he laments.

In 2011, when he was in his 10th gang, he participated in a mission that received international attention.

“We were targeting a jeweller whom we had been told had millions of shillings in cash. How the police got wind of our plan remains a mystery. But during the 9am incident, I was at the wheel of the getaway car,” he says.

They were caught up in a traffic jam on Langa’ta Road when three  police officers came, stood in front of their car and ordered them out.

“A member sitting at the back cocked his gun and the sound made the officers focus on him. That gave me just enough time to scramble out of the car, mingle with pedestrians and get away from the scene. At the bar where I sought refuge, I saw on television how my four colleagues were ordered to lie down on the tarmac and shot dead,” he says.

Three months later, he was in a four-man gang that raided a bank on Mfang’ano Street in Nairobi with insider help.

“We made away with a safe containing Sh9 million. Unfortunately, we did not have the technological expertise to open it. In our effort to prise it open, we caused security ink to spill on the loot. There was no way we could wash it off, and the ink spreads in such a way that it defaces all the money. Sh9 million rich one minute, Sh0 the next minute. For the first time in my life in crime, I shed tears,” he says.

In 2012, he decided to take his wife home.  “But there was no way I could take her to my father’s homestead. The police would arrest her to force me turn myself in. I rented five rooms in a plot at the nearby Gatanga Shopping Centre to ensure that my wife was the only tenant there. But one night when I was visiting, the police came at about 2am,” he recounts.

SOFT CRIMES

“I engaged them in a gunfight as I fled.  Interestingly, they did not arrest my wife. I went into hiding in Limuru in Kiambu County,” he says.

Thereafter, he got into “soft” crimes such as carjacking and walking into businesses premises, demanding cash and walking out.

“By 2013, the world of crime  had become dangerously narrow. The police had become smart, and technological innovation had made communicating by phone foolhardy,” he offers.

So, broke and desperate, he kidnapped a two-year-old boy in Limuru with the help of a female  accomplice. They demanded a Sh70,000 ransom, which they got and released the boy after three days.

He then started carjacking on the Gatanga, Thika, Kandara and Murang’a routes.

By 2015, things were bad.  “It was hard to make even make Sh20,000 in a month. Besides, I was aware that getting shot by the police was just seconds away … I was conscious that I had a family. I was not ready to die,” he says.

So, was he ever arrested?

Oh yes,  several times.

“But what is an arrest when you have ready cash? There is a saying in the criminal world that a police officer who can refuse to set you free in exchange for cash is beyond help? Yes, criminals in Kenya more often than not buy their freedom. But sometimes the police are dead serious and will kill you,” he says.

So in May 2015, he went back to his village a born-again Christian with one mission: to make peace with his parents, neighbours and the government.

“I went to a neighbour, Mzee Thomas Ngarachu, and told  him my story. He was very helpful. I also contacted some media houses to cover my public repentance while the government organised a baraza at my rural shopping centre, where I denounced crime,” he says.

After his mother died, his father, Mwaganu wa Kiraing’wa remarried. He and his wife, Jane Wanjiru, say they have forgiven him and have even given him a piece of land so that he can rebuild his life.

The village organised a harambee and bought him a motorcycle, which he uses as a taxi to earn a living.

“From the millions I was making in crime, today I make about Sh500 a day. The millions only benefited corrupt police officers, prostitutes, bar owners and nyama choma den owners. I came out the unpaid worker. But the Sh500 I make gives me satisfaction because I can enjoy peace with my family,” he says.

His message to youngsters is: “Crime does not pay, I am living testimony to 22 years of a wasted life.”

Sounds like fiction?

Murang’a County Police Commander Ms Naomi Ichami says she learnt about  Mwaganu’s criminal exploits when he made a public confession at a  public security Baraza.

“We investigated his case confirmed that he was telling the truth.  We made him commit to us that he was, indeed, reformed. But he remains on our watch list to make sure he walks the talk,” she says.

*****

In numbers

I0: Age at which Elias Hiti Mwaganu left school and became an  urchin

13: Age at which he moved from Murang’a to Nairobi and joined a gang

19: Age at which he formed  his own gang

13: Total number of gangs he joined

78: The number of gangsters he worked with; he is the sole survivor