Daytime Uniformed Cops And Armed Thugs At Night

Yesterday Kenya Insights wrote about three officers, all attached to Kayole Police Station, alongside the Cameronian foreigner were nabbed after allegedly accosting some two Eastleigh residents to a lodging, where they stole Sh6 million at gunpoint.

According to media reports, at least 625 cases of police officers being involved in active crime have been reported in the last 10 months only. Uniformed folks that are armed by the government to protect the unarmed and keep law and order have turned vicious assassins and street thugs.

This translates to about 62 cases of police officers being linked to crime every month and two cases every day. Inspector-General of Police Hillary Mutyambai in April failed to resolve the issues of police officers getting involved in crime during a meeting he called after his appointment.

At the time, police officers from an elite DCI unit based at Parklands DCI offices had been arrested and detained at a roadblock manned by regular police officers in Kitengela on suspicion that they were escorting contraband ethanol.

The meeting called at the IG’s Jogoo House office failed to reach an agreement on the matter after DCI chief George Kinoti accused DIG Edward Mbugua of failing to reign in his officers for allegedly harassing his officers.

The incidents range from officers seeking the Sh50 bribes at police roadblocks to more complex cases but not limited to murder, robberies, extortion, kidnapping, gunrunning and drug trafficking, among other serious crimes.

“It’s true more incidents linking police officers have been reported lately. All is not lost as we are dealing with the situation firmly,” Police Spokesman Charles Owino admitted that things were not as they should be in the police service.

He said lack of proper supervision of junior officers by their seniors had led to cases of officers engaging in crime. Owino said among things police chiefs were doing to deal with the problem was firing officers involved in crime.

“Police commanders have been instructed to closely supervise their juniors and to let go any officer found wanting,” he said.

In 2016, a government report revealed that more than a third of crimes reported to the police involved police officers themselves. The Economic Survey 2016 revealed that policemen were involved in 24,647 or 34 per cent of the total 72,490 cases of crimes reported to the police in 2015.

The report indicted the security officers with a conclusion that crime continued to grow despite billions of shillings being invested in the purchase of equipment and recruitment of additional officers to enhance the ratio of security personnel to the population.

The report further revealed that policemen were mostly involved in drug trafficking, criminal damage and economic crimes.

Last week, Mutyambai announced a Sh377 billion budget that he hopes will help fight crime. In it, the police proposed that Sh9 billion be spent to set up a criminal database. The depth to which police officers have sunk could send the Interior ministry back to the drawing board to rethink new ways of reigning on the criminals in their rank and file.

Police officer getting involved in organised crimes such as the Sh72 million Nairobi bank heist. At least four police officers have since been arrested and charged in court over the stolen cash. Part of the loot as well as vehicles bought with the stolen money have also been recovered from the police officers.

Last week, a police couple was among three suspects arrested over the Standard Chartered Bank ATM cash theft. A KDF officer, also a relative to the couple, was arrested by officers from the Special Crimes Prevention Unit during a police operation on suspected thugs linked to the heist. Police did not recover any money and it is believed that the cash was being hidden in a house at a military barrack in Nairobi.

The state will always be losing this simple menace infested in the force by criminal way of recruiting the very same people armed cops that turn against the public. Flawed recruiting filled with bribes some allegedly expensive as they involve acres of land and other properties.

The government remains losing not only money in the case of cases like the ex-Gatundu MP who was awarded sh15 million as compensation after a cop shot dead his lawyer son but also the citizens who end up losing their innocent lives abruptly to rogue cops.