A 24-year old car hire service operator Abdirazak Muktar escorted by police officers to Milimani law court basement cells after he was sentenced to 20 years in jail for supporting terror activities and groups on Friday September Friday September 30,2016
BY NT REPORTER.
A Nairobi Court on Friday convicted a 24-year old car hire service operator convicted of being a member of Somalia based militia group.
He was sentenced to 20 years in jail for supporting terror activities and groups.
Abdirazak Muktar was further sentenced on Friday to 10 years in prison for each of six other related offences, for which he was found guilty.
He was arrested in the Maasai Mara Game reserve in 2014 was found in possession of various terror-related items—including pictures and videos of the late Al Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden and Samantha Louise Lewthwaite. He also had pictures of the Westgate Mall attack.
“By his conduct he was a member of a terrorist group, ” trial Magistrate Joyce Ngandani ruled while sentencing the accused.
In the video that was in his possession, the accused who is a father of one urges Muslims to join the Al Shabab group.
He was also found in possession of materials linked to terrorism and giving support to the terror groups, according to the prosecution during the trial period—in which the magistrate said was sufficiently proved to send him to jail.
While passing the sentence, the magistrate noted that “terrorism activities has cost Kenyans lives’ and economic status” and thus supports the government in fighting terrorism by sending him to jail to “serve as an example to other youths who might be considering joining such groups.”
The prosecution said the accused had been operating a car hire business in Mandera where eight grenades among other terror-related materials were seized.
He was also accused of committing terror activities in Mandera and at a Mosque in Mombasa.
Gandani said he was also found with pictures and videos of slain terrorist Osama bin Laden and Samantha Lewthwaithe.
Muktar was also charged with sending invitations using his cell phone, for a ‘radicalisation meeting’ at Masjid Musa on February 2, “to further the cause of a terror group.”
He denied being a member of the al Qaeda-linked terror group.
