Justice finally served on the late Ivy Wangechi, the Moi University medical student murdered in cold blood in April 2019 as the High Court Sentenced the main suspect in the murder, Naftali Kinuthia to 40 years in prison.
The High Court in Eldoret today jailed Naftali Kinuthia to 40 years, this comes barely a month after he was convicted of the heinous murder.
Justice Stephen Githinji who has been presiding over the trial of the case since 2019, ruled that the offence committed was brutal and called for a harsh sentence against the convict.
The judge remarked that an innocent soul was lost.
The lawyers for the victim and the state had called for the death penalty to be imposed on Kinuthia but the Judge struck out the plea, stating that the court could not buy the idea of a tooth for a tooth in delivering the judgment.
Earlier, Kinuthia had pleaded for a non-custodial sentence saying it would give him a second chance in life.
Justice Githinji had indicated that Kinuthia’s actions were premeditated, as he used an axe that he had bought purposely to kill Wangechi.
“If he had no intention to kill, he had the opportunity to attack the victim using his bare fist. But he had an axe and a knife and used an axe, a lethal and dangerous weapon, to strike the medical student,” the judge stated.
Justice Githinji however tore into the accused for denying that he had a knife, terming it laughable when he claimed in his defense that he was given the knife by a member of the public.
The Judge stated that Kinuthia did not even use the knife he had to attack Wangeci, noting that a knife would have probably given the deceased a second chance to live.
He also dismissed allegations by Kinuthia in his defense hearing that he was intimately involved with Wangechi. Kinuthia gave his final defense evidence in the murder case at the Eldoret-based High Court on Friday, March 3, almost four years after the murder took place.
He traced his relationship with the late Wangechi to their childhood days in primary school, adding that before her demise, she borrowed him Ksh28,000 to fund her birthday party which he agreed to.
“She said she planned to have a big party because it was supposed to be the last one with her friends, so she told me she was planning to spend Ksh28,000, that was her budget. She asked me if I could support her with the funds and I accepted,” he recalled in part.
He further recalled how he had traveled from Nairobi to Eldoret to wish her happy birthday, after funding the party and seeing his intimate lover and long-time friend hugging another man.
This was despite their relationship being estranged to the point that she had blocked his number for some time making it impossible for him to reach her.
