On Monday, Pangani’s infamous police officer, Ahmed Rashid, was charged with the murder of two teenagers in Eastleigh on March 31, 2017. Rashid is accused of killing Jamal Mohammed and Mohammed Dhair Kheri at Amal Plaza in Eastleigh estate, Nairobi, over allegations that they were part of a criminal gang.
In court documents, Rashid claimed that he was “operating in the line of duty and in self-defense” during the alleged shooting of the teenagers. He denied two counts of murder before Justice Diana Mochache and the prosecution requested that he be remanded at the Industrial Area pending a bail hearing.
Rashid’s lawyer, Danstan Omari, asked the court to grant him a cash bail of Sh100,000 and argued that he had been out on police bond and had not absconded. Justice Mochache declined the prosecution’s application to cancel Rashid’s bond and released him on a cash bail of Sh200,000.
The ruling comes after months of deferred court appearances as Rashid had alleged that NGOs pressing for his prosecution were using the court process to raise funds. He had petitioned for protection from prosecutors and civil society, who had been pushing for his prosecution for allegedly killing the teenagers in March 2017.
Last month, the Independent Medico-Legal Unit (IMLU), a human rights group, expressed dissatisfaction over the court’s delay in prosecuting Rashid over the murder. The IMLU had challenged the country’s judicial system to fast-track cases of police brutality for the sake of justice for the victims.
Rashid, dubbed the “killer cop” by media outlets, was filmed shooting the two young men as they lay on the ground on a busy street in Eastleigh. The Independent Policing Oversight Authority (IPOA) watchdog had recommended murder charges against him in November, stating that their investigation into the deaths “established that the fatalities were occasioned by police action.”
