Police recover 200 bags of coffee ‘hidden’ in store after theft claim

Young men use a pick up to haul coffee from a store to a lorry at Kagere Coffee Factory in Othaya on February 3, 2016 after the police ordered managers to ferry the commodity to the Thika Coffee Mills due to safety concerns. PHOTO | JOSEPH KANYI | NATION MEDIA GROUP

What you need to know:

  • Police have intensified the search for those behind the theft of coffee that has rocked more than 10 factories in the region.

  • Three days ago, the factory reported that they had lost more than 200 bags of coffee in a raid.

  • However, preliminary investigations revealed the produce was still within the factory.

Police in Nyeri yesterday found 200 missing bags of coffee hidden in a factory.

A manager at Kagere Coffee Factory had claimed that the coffee had been stolen.

Police have intensified the search for those behind the theft of coffee that has rocked more than 10 factories in the region.

Three days ago, factory officials reported that they had lost more than 200 bags of coffee in a raid. However, preliminary investigations revealed the produce was still within the factory.

Police also discovered the factory had more coffee than what it had collected from farmers, meaning either that it did not declare what farmers delivered or the excess coffee was sourced from elsewhere.

The discovery was made after police took a physical count of all coffee at the factory and cross-checked with records of the produce delivered by farmers.

The three-day exercise, conducted under heavy police security, revealed that the factory had an extra 7,757 kilograms of coffee, which is over 300 bags.

“From the exercise, we can tell that no coffee was stolen as the factory had reported,” said area Deputy County Commissioner Evans Ogwankwa.

Mr Ogwankwa was supervising the transportation of the coffee to the Thika Coffee Mills after the factory was given a go-ahead to sell their produce to a miller of their own choice.

POLICE TO INVOLVE EXPERTS IN PROBE

Initially, 257,263 kilograms of cherry were collected from farmers and it was expected this would drop once the coffee is dried.

The factory’s manager, Mr Joseph Gakuo, said every seven kilos of cherry produces a kilogram of parchment after drying.

From this, the amount of parchment expected to be acquired is 36,751.9 kilograms. The physical count, however, came out with 44,509 kilograms.

The factory officials, however, said the formula used to calculate the expected amount was inaccurate as different grades of coffee produce different weight.

“Only the high grades such as P1 give more parchment weight so the method they are using will only victimize innocent people,” said Mr Gakuo.

Police findings also revealed there was no evidence showing coffee was stolen from the factory in the Sunday morning incident.

“There are even no tyre tracks showing a lorry carried coffee as per the reports by factory officials,” said county Police Commander Eunice Kihiko.

Police said they would involve experts in the industry to conduct further investigations.

This comes after security officials said that all factories will be required to share all coffee records with the police without fail.

Over the past five months, more than 10 factories have been raided and more than 600 bags of coffee worth over Sh100 million reported to have been stolen.

Ndurutu, Kiamariga, Tekangu, Rukira, Ichamama, Gititu and Ndima-ini are some of the factories that have been hit hard by the thieves. Forty bags were stolen from Ndima-ini, in Mathira East.

Over 250 bags of the coffee have been stolen from factories in the past one month. The Kagere factory's alleged theft is the most recent one, where more than 200 bags of coffee were reported to have been stolen.

A week earlier, more than 50 bags of coffee were stolen from Chinga Coffee Factory in Othaya.