Shoddy investigation denies murdered barmaid justice

The late Jane Nduta. She was murdered in 2017 in Murang’a County. Suspects linked to her murder were released due to lack of evidence. PHOTO | COURTESY

What you need to know:

  • Mr Mwangi says the police never visited the hospital to question the victim, and that the procedures for handling a rape victim were not followed.

On January 26, 2017, Jane Nduta, 40, left Joyland Bar in Kaharati, Murang’a County, where she worked as a barmaid, around 10.30pm.

The mother of three had left her husband, Patrick Maina, in 2012 after a 10-year marriage.

Since she did not have a car, she relied on public transport to get to her rented house in Maragua Town, 10 kilometres away.

She did not get home that night. The following morning, she was found naked in a thicket, five kilometres from the bar where she worked. She had been assaulted.

Today, more than two years after her death, the Nation’s attempts to find out how she died have revealed gross negligence, or incompetence, on the part of the investigators.

RAPE

According to then-Murang’a County Police boss Naomi Ichami, Nduta “had been strangled, hit with a blunt object on the head and raped”.

“She was in a bad state when Maragua Police Station officers brought her in. She was alive, yes, but in a very bad shape,” says Mr James Mwangi, a Maragua Level Four Hospital nurse who was on duty that morning.

He adds that she was not attended to by a doctor since they were on strike. After four days, her relatives moved her to Kiririaini and Kimkan private hospitals after she went into a coma.

She was finally admitted to Outspan, also a private hospital in Nyeri, where she died seven days later.

Then-Murang’a DCIO Julius Rutere says that investigations into Nduta’s death were hampered by lack of information. “No one was willing to come forward with any clue that could lead us to her possible assailants,” he says.

NO STATEMENT

But Mr Mwangi says the police never visited the hospital to question the victim, and that the procedures for handling a rape victim were not followed.

He says that Nduta’s relatives were allowed to bathe her, which could have compromised the collection of evidence for nailing her rapist.

“I notified the media of the incident and took it upon myself to pursue leads. She never recorded a statement before she died,” he says.

The investigating officers did not also visit the place where schoolchildren found Nduta until a week later. Four suspects were arrested, but freed for lack of evidence.

LEADS IGNORED

Inquiries by the Nation however show that the investigators ignored leads that would have been useful.

“She had a lover who rides a boda-boda. I was the first person to visit her at Maragua hospital. She told me he was the one who attacked her,” says her former employer, Ms Leah Mwangi.

Ms Mwangi adds that at the time Nduta's death, they were not in good terms.

Asked whether she notified the police, she says: “I told the investigators who visited her place of work. They took my number, promising to call, but never did.”