By Mercy Imali
The murder case against TV journalist Jackie Maribe and her former fiancée ‘Jowie’ seems to be getting tighter by the day.
A statement by Brian Kasaine, Jowie’s friend and neighbor shows why police believe that the two are culpable.
Kasaine, who had been arrested and then released on condition that he become a state witness gives details of Jowie’s activities on the night of the murder as well as the days that followed.
Kasaine statement reveals he gave Jowie the gun with which he is believed to have shot himself. He said that he had given Jowie the gun on a previous occasion as he knew him as an “undercover officer”.
On the night of 20th September, 2018 he received a WhatsApp call from Jowie at around 2am seeking to know if he had “paraffin or anything flammable or air freshener in the house.”
“I got surprised at such request of these items by him at such late hour. He adds that he “jokingly” asked Jowie why he was looking for paraffin in the middle of the night.”He replied, ‘tulikuwa job fulani na Mo-Muhoho na nikama alidunga mtu kisu’ (I was with Mo-Muhoho yesterday for an assignment and he stabbed somebody,” Kasaine’s statement reads.
Kasaine adds that Jowie told him that he wanted to burn some stuff and had used some air freshener “while pointing towards the empty plot across their house.”
At the end of the statement, Kasaine names John Muhoho again clarifying that this was the “Mo” that Jowie had said may have stabbed someone.
A Statement by investigating officer, Maxwell Otieno of the Directorate of Criminal Investigations outlines events that could have led to the murder.
Otieno reveals that tests by the Government Chemist in a report reference A 199/2018 dated 13th December, 2018, confirmed that DNA profile generated from a short Jowie wore on the day of the murder marched that generated from Monica’s blood sample.
“After the commission of the crime, the accused person burnt the clothes he was wearing at the scene of crime at the second accused residence in her presence,” Otieno says in the statement.ays that witnesses have placed Jowie in Monica’s house and two of them – Daboul Walid and Owen Omondi – had said they left him there on that day.
Another fresh detail is that Jowie changed into a different set of clothes before he allegedly went to see Monica in his house.
“The accused changed and dressed in a white kanzu, grey coat and red cap in the immediate presence of Jennings Olando (a Recce squad officer who also had been arrested during investigations). These were the same clothes that he was putting on while at the residence of the deceased on a fateful day as confirmed by Owen, Walid and guards at the Lamuria gardens apartments,” Otieno’s statement reads.
He says that Jowie was in the same red cap at Club 40 Forty on the night of the murder and witnesses say he had it at Monica’s house. He says that Monica introduced Jowie to Walid and Owen as someone who works with the Interpol as they sat in her house.
He indicates that at one time while they were watching the news on TV, Jowie commented; “They (Interpol) him included had arrested 19 terrorists in Lamu who were to be ferried to Nairobi for deportation.”
Otieno’s statement also indicated that Jowie also claimed to be wearing a kanzu to enable him “blend with the Somali community since he alleged that he resides in Eastleigh.”
“When Owen said that he desired a firearm for protection purposes, the 1st accused offered that he was going to assist him to acquire one either through the legal or illegal process,” the statement says.
He adds; “Owen confirmed that while in the deceased house, Jowie received several phone calls whereby he would move aside and speak in coded language over the phone.”
One of the reasons that police believe that Jowie murdered Monica is, as Otieno indicates, he had informed Jennings of who he was going to see.
“He informed Jennings Olando whom he was with that he was going to visit a lady friend who had just arrived from South Sudan,” the statement reads.
At the beginning of his statement, Otieno says that on September 19, 2018, Monica flew from Juba and landed at JKIA at around 5.30pm.
On Maribe, Otieno says that her car was at the scene of the crime and she was seen in it on the same night.
“The accused person witnessed the burning of the clothes by the first accused on the night of the incident near her residence,” Otieno lists this as the second supporting evidence.
He also says that Maribe’s phone was within the same area of the incident and was switched off at about 10.25pm, which is about the time the murder happened and was switched on at around 9.52am the following day.
“Considering the above, it is evident that the accused persons jointly murdered the deceased,” Otieno’s statement reads.
He gives the fourth reason as that Maribe gave contradicting statements on how Jowie had sustained his gunshot injury, thus depicting her as “dishonest and hence her alibi in respect of the date of the murder is not believable”.
His final reason of Maribe’s involvement is that she and Jowie were spotted at Club 40 Forty almost immediately after the incident and later in the same car when it was spotted near the scene of the crime.
In his statement, Otieno concludes that his team has “overwhelming evidence” against Jowie and Maribe.