Industrial Area inmates taken to Kamiti after days of protest

Kamiti Maximum Security Prison in Nairobi. FILE PHOTO | NATION MEDIA GROUP

What you need to know:

  • Commissioner of Prisons, Mr Isaiah Osugo, said the move was arrived at after it became hard to control the group that started the protest.

  • The hunger strike by the inmates entered the second day Tuesday, with the prisoners demanding the removal of the officer in-charge of the prison, Mr Samuel Ruto.

A number of capital remandees were Tuesday transferred from the Industrial Area Remand Prison to Kamiti Maximum Prison after they turned rowdy, demanding that the officer in charge be removed.

Commissioner of Prisons, Mr Isaiah Osugo, said the move was arrived at after it became hard to control the group that started the protest.

Mr Osugo denied claims that an inmate had died inside one of the cells after being beaten. He also denied that an inmate had been injured and that the pictures shared on social media were stage-managed and meant to attract the attention of the public.

HUNGER STRIKE

The hunger strike by the inmates entered the second day Tuesday, with the prisoners demanding the removal of the officer in-charge of the prison, Mr Samuel Ruto, whom they blamed for ‘harassment and mistreatment’.

“Since he was transferred to this facility in February, we have been facing brutality, substandard service provision, and mismanagement, inhuman search late at night and very early in the morning,” an inmate said.

They claimed a prison officer, Mr Wilson Tonui, was beating up remandees.

"He assaulted John Kibowen who died at Block L in the presence of inmates and the body was carried to a standby ambulance and ferried to City mortuary,” the inmate said. Kibowen had been charged with impersonating IG of Police Joseph Boinnet on social media. His case was still in court.