Four members of a Nairobi based self-help group were on Friday morning arraigned in court for their involvement in a Sh 1billion land fraud.
The four who included a former Kayole chief Alexander Hoops, Patrobas Awino, Peter Gitau and Peter Njoroge pleaded not guilty to charges of forging the title deed of the Donholm Estate parcel of land, its lease and an allotment letter.
The arrest and subsequent arraignment of the four followed complaints filed at DCI’s Land Fraud Investigations Unit in 2018 by two parties; Sowesava Self Help Group and Gidjoy Company Limited.
Upon investigations, detectives had by 2019 established that Gidjoy Co. Ltd bought the land from Continental Ltd, thereafter legally and successfully transferring the ownership of the parcel of land to its name.
But the Sowesava officials had maintained that Continental Ltd surrendered the parcel to the Nairobi County Government, upon which they (Sowesava) were issued with an allotment letter and processed a title deed.
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The self help group had hence gone ahead to subdivide the parcel into 100 portions, which they were in the process of selling to unsuspecting members of the public when detectives stepped in.
Meticulous investigations revealed that both the allotment letter and the mother title deed presented by Sowesava had been forged, leading to the arrest of four of its officials in 2019.
However, the four filed an injunction before the High Court, which was heard and upon determination, a ruling was made that the suspects plead to their charges on August 5, 2021.
The suspects appeared before Chief magistrate Martha Mutuku at the Milimani law courts and each of them was slapped with a Sh2 million bond or a cash bail of Sh1 million.
