Now hunt for wanted Kenyan fugitive targets US

Kenya has formally asked the US government to help capture and repatriate runaway former Kenya Pipeline Company managing director Linus Cheruiyot.

Dr Cheruiyot sneaked out of the country while facing a Sh339 million fraud charge and the police want him deported to stand trial.

He is believed to be holed up in Texas, USA, with his family. 

The request of the Kenyan Government was sent through Interpol to the US Attorney General in Washington DC on April 30, CID sources told the Nation yesterday.

Attached to the request was a warrant of arrest issued by the High Court, a letter from Attorney General Amos Wako detailing the charges facing Dr Cheruiyot in Kenya and his personal documents.

A report detailing Dr Cheruiyot's alleged criminal history was also attached and it says the CID were likely to open other fraud charges against him when he is brought back to the country.

Dr Cheruiyot was also under investigations over a deal through which the Kenya Pipeline lost prime land in Nairobi's Upper Hill area in dubious transactions.

The warrant sent to Washington was obtained by CID officers investigating Dr Cheruiyot's case after he skipped bail and fled the country.

But the US authorities have first to confirm that Dr Cheruiyot is actually in their country before they start processing the request by their Kenyan counterparts. So far, it is not known how he slipped out of Kenya.

"We are now waiting to hear a feedback from Washington if he has been captured," a senior CID source said. "It's after he is captured that we will arrange for his deportation. The ball is now in the court of the US authorities."

Dr Cheruiyot, together with eight others, had been arrested and charged in February last year with conspiring to defraud KPC of Sh339 million through a fraudulent computer tender deal.

He was charged with two former Pipeline employees, Ms Helen Njue (former finance manager) and Mr Paul Njuguna Gituku (former projects manager). The other accused are directors of a city computer firm, Mr Donald Kiboro Mwaura, Mr Peter Kihanya, Mr Joseph Njenga, Ms Elizabeth Mumbi and Ms Eunice Wangui. They all denied the charges and were set free on bonds of Sh10 million each.

It is under these circumstances that Dr Cheruiyot’s failure to appear in court over the Sh339 million case sent alarm bells ringing. 

In March, Nairobi chief magistrate Aggrey Muchelule ordered the arrest of Dr Cheruiyot when he failed to appear in court.

At the time, Dr Cheruiyot’s lawyers had asked the court not to issue a warrant of arrest pleading that he had travelled to be with his wife, who was to undergo surgery in a US hospital.

On the day he ordered the former MD’s arrest, Mr Muchelule had also summoned to court Dr Cheruiyot's surety to explain his whereabouts. 

It was on establishing that Dr Cheruiyot was out of the country against his bail conditions that the police asked for help from Interpol. 

People who are close to Dr Cheruiyot say he may have disposed of some of his properties, including a Nairobi petrol station near the Mater Hospital, before leaving the country early this year. The petrol station is now being run by a former State House official.

Investigators are trying to figure out under what circumstances the KPC management under Dr Cheruiyot exchanged the Upper Hill plot, worth more than Sh50 million, for a piece of land in Embakasi whose value was less than Sh10 million.

Kenya Pipeline had been allocated the Upper Hill plot, LR number 208/1077, measuring 11.5 acres, in 1988. At the time the commercial plot was valued at Sh37.5 million.

In late 2002, Dr Cheruiyot wrote to the Commissioner of Lands surrendering the undeveloped plot and asking that KPC be allocated alternative land in Embakasi. The Commissioner of Lands took back the Upper Hill plot and in exchange gave the company a plot listed as LR number 9042/693 in Embakasi. 

Shortly afterwards, the much more valuable plot in Upper Hill was allocated to private developers. 

A valuation carried out on the Embakasi plot – at Dr Cheruiyot’s request – for the purposes of the exchange had placed the plot’s value at Sh35 million. 

But both the new Pipeline management headed by the former Rangwe MP, Dr Shem Ochuodho, and CID investigators are questioning the valuation.

They believe that the value of the plot was grossly exaggerated to justify the State corporation surrendering the pricey Upper Hill plot which almost immediately went into private hands.