BY SAM ALFAN.
Police Sergeant Rashid Ahmed Hassan who is accused of cold-blood murder of two robbery suspects has moved to court to block his charges.
Rashid wants the court to restrain the Director of Public Prosecution Noordin Haji, the Independent Policing Oversight Authority and the Inspector General of Police from preferring murder charges against him.
The officer through lawyer Danstan Omari and Cliff Ombeta wants the court to stop the DPP and IPOA from commencing the intended prosecution against him.
“Unless this matter is heard exparte in the first instance, the petitioner’s rights to a fair administrative action shall be violated notwithstanding the fact that the unfortunate occurrence happened over six years ago while the petitioner was operating in the line of duty and in self defense,” Omari stated.
Rashid argues that the actions and decision of the DPP and IPOA to charge him abuse of power arbitrary exercise of authority to achieve a purpose unconnected with rule of law or objective of the system of the administration of justice and he will not receive square contrary to his rights
There has been a push to have him charged with the murder of Jamal Mohamed and Mohammed Dhair Kheri whose deaths occurred on March 31, 2017 at Amal plaza within Eastleigh.
IPOA had moved to the High Court and obtained summons against Rashid to attend court and take plea on December 8, 2022 for the alleged offense.
Rashid, who is currently attached at Pangani Police Station argues that IPOA moved to court even before summoning him to appear before them for purposes of witness recording and to hear his side of the story.
“The petitioner is bewildered by the turn of events and has well founded fear that the respondents are not acting in good faith and have a bad motive in their decision thus a well choreographed to fix him without any lawful basis,” Rashid states.
He said he has never been processed nor presented before a psychiatrist for examination and has reasonable fear that he shall be arraigned to take plea for the alleged offense.
The officer claims that the two accused in a shootout with the police during a robbery at Amal Plaza in Nairobi.
He added that he and his colleagues had been trailing the two robbers who had allegedly robbed persons in the area.
Rashid claims that they recovered home made gun capable of firing, a Somali sword and knives which had been used in the robbery.
Rashid adds that the robbers who were seven in number at them and members of the public.
Rashid said that in a bid to protect lives, one robber who was carrying the homemade gun was gunned down in the heavy exchange of gunfire. One the robbers upon realizing that he was cornered tried to snatch a firearm from a police officer. In a ensuing scuffle he was shot and neutralized.
He added that a night before the incident, they had robbed Al Noor Guleed his mobile phone and over Sh200,000. They had stabbed him twice in the head and was able to possibly identify two of the killed robbers as the assailants who had attacked him. He is still under medication following the incident.
In his supporting affidavit, Rashid adds that when he was posted at the Pangani police station in the year 2015, there were several complaints from members of the public about increase of organized and violent crimes with the area. Members of public were being robbed and killed within Eastleigh Mlango Kubwa, Mathare and Pangani area.
He learnt the crimes were committed by gangs of young men and the guise of being members of outlawed gangs called superpower and Gaza.
“In the course of our work , I learnt superpower gang was a local network of the Al Shabaab and was used to conduct grenades attacks within the larger Eastleigh and Nairobi county. Through my team concerted efforts and the police command , we managed to arrest the situation by dealing and tackling the criminals who were perpetuating the crimes. We managed to put a stop to the carjacking along Juja road , reduced armed robberies and mugging,” Rashid says in his court documents.
