BY SAM ALFAN.
Three men serving a death sentence for stripping and robbing a female passenger in a Githurai-bound bus in Nairobi in December 2014 want the court to set them free.
They claim the trial magistrate erred in law by sentencing them to death.
The three, Bus driver Nicholas Mwangi, conductor Meshack Mwangi and petrol station attendant Edward Ndung’u claim that the learned magistrate erred in law and in fact when he convicted and sentenced them to death on the charge of robbery with violence without any sufficient evidence.
Further, they want the appeal allowed and the conviction and sentence against them quashed and set aside.
In the appeal filed by their lawyer Harrison Kinyanjui, the three men say that trail magistrate Francis Andayi erred in law in shifting the burden of proof on them.
They have listed 22 grounds on which they want the court to consider in their favor.
In mid-July this year the three men were found guilty of robbery with violence and assault by Nairobi Chief Magistrate Francis Andayi.
The magistrate handed them another sentence of 25 years in jail for stripping and sexually assaulting the woman. But the jail term was suspended as the trio had already been handed the death penalty.
The three had been charged with robbery with violence and assault.
According to the prosecution on the night of September 19 and 20 at Millennium Petrol Station in Githurai 44, jointly with others, they robbed a woman identified as H E W (to protect her identity) of10,200), a Samsung Galaxy mobile phone worth 27,000, one bottle of perfume, a clutch bag and a makeup kit all amounting to 41,700.
They further faced a charge of sexually assaulting the victim in the incident that caused uproar after a video clip of the act was circulated on social media.
