This archive report was first published on 26 October 2019.
On Friday, Josphat Kimanthi Mutua, a 40-year-old man, appeared before a Makadara law court in Nairobi, charged with defiling his friend's 13-year-old daughter for over a year.
According to the prosecution, the alleged defilement occurred between January 2012 and November 4, 2013, in Kayole, Nairobi. Mutua was also charged with committing an indecent act with the minor.
Mutua, a friend and neighbor to the victim's mother for over 10 years, allegedly took advantage of the minor while her mother was away working as a domestic worker in Westlands.
On November 4, 2013, the minor's mother received a call from a clinical officer in Kangundo, informing her that her daughter had been defiled several times while she was at work.
The minor visited the clinic complaining of abdominal pains and was examined by the medic, who discovered she had been defiled. She then opened up and confessed to the clinical officer that she had an affair with a man.
The medic sent a message to Mutua, pretending to be the minor, and told him she was pregnant and needed money for an abortion. Mutua allegedly sent her KES 3,500 and requested her to visit him after the abortion, promising to buy her a teddy bear and other niceties.
He called her four days later to find out if the abortion had been successful, which she lied had been done, and he invited her to his house. The victim's mother sent her bus fare to Nairobi and reported the matter at Spring Valley AP post in Kayole.
Police officers then told the mother to let the girl go to Mutua's house while the officers trailed them from a distance. They found the suspect with the minor in his house.
Mutua denied the charges before senior principal magistrate Angelo Kithinji and was freed on a KES 300,000 bond with a surety of similar amount.
