Convict Gilbert Masengeli, who has reverted to his previous post as Deputy Inspector-General of the Administration Police, has lost his bid to block the start of his six-month jail term. This is after Justice Chacha Mwita of the High Court declined to grant his request to appear before Justice Lawrence Mugambi today (Thursday), who sentenced him to jail for contempt of court, for apology.....CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE>>>
Mr Masengeli was seeking to appear before Justice Mugambi on Thursday at 3pm to void his conviction and sentence. He had been given a grace period of seven days to mitigate his jail sentence, which expires at 5pm Thursday.
On Wednesday, hours before expiry of the seven-day grace period, he moved to the Court of Appeal and filed and urgent appeal to expel his sentence on grounds that he was unfairly condemned. However, the three-judge bench at the Appellate Court declined to suspend the jail sentence, with Justices Gatembu Kairu, Weldon Korir and Aggrey Muchelule directing that the matter be handled next week following an application by the Law Society of Kenya (LSK) for more time to respond to the application.
Come Thursday, Mr Masengeli, through his lawyer Cecil Miller, sought to appear before Justice Mugambi between 12 and 3pm as he battled to avoid going to prison. However, the lawyer was informed by Justice Mwita that Mr Mugambi was not available as he was handling another matter before a three-judge bench.
Instead, Justice Mwita ordered that the police boss appears before Justice Mugambi tomorrow (Friday) as scheduled for directions on purging his sentence.
Suspended sentence
While sentencing him in absentia last week, Justice Mugambi said he would suspend the jail term for seven days to give Mr Masengeli time to vindicate himself.
“… The court shall suspend this sentence for seven days only. The acting Inspector-General can redeem himself by availing himself before this court in person to answer the issues which he has been avoiding. Failure to doing so, the sentence will take effect,” Justice Mugambi ruled at the time.
The police boss was expected to offer an explanation for the recent snubs, after which the judge would decide whether to impose a fine or not as he had been convicted already…CLICK HERE FOR MORE ARTICLE>>>
