A chilling CCTV recording has captured the moment an armed robber stormed a salon in Ruaka, Kiambu County, assaulting two women and firing gunshots before escaping with a stolen phone on a waiting motorcycle.
The two-minute clip, filmed in broad daylight on Friday, July 10, at around 2 p.m., shows a masked man dressed in green overalls and a black hat approaching two women seated outside the salon and demanding their phones at gunpoint.
When one of the women tried to conceal her phone, the attacker grabbed and struck her with the firearm as she screamed for help. Bystander Bridgit Amase, who witnessed the attack, said the gunman fired without warning, causing her friend to collapse in panic before she fled to call for assistance.
The footage shows the assailant dragging one victim into the salon at gunpoint while the other escaped after surrendering her phone. Inside, six other people scrambled to hide as the gunman forced the second woman to the ground and demanded her valuables.
As screams drew a crowd outside, the robber abandoned further looting and fled, firing shots into the air to scatter onlookers before leaping onto a motorbike that had been waiting nearby — a detail suggesting the attack was carefully planned.
Amase noted that the attacker appeared to be targeting one specific phone, pointing out that he ignored other valuables and clients inside the salon despite having the opportunity to take more. One victim similarly observed that the calculated nature of the attack set it apart from an ordinary robbery, since the gunman left with only a single phone.
The Ruaka incident comes amid a wave of armed robberies rattling Nairobi and Kiambu residents. In a separate case about seven kilometres away, a family lost more than Sh1.9 million after suspected robbers broke into their vehicle at Runda Shopping Centre. The three suspects are believed to have trailed the victims from a bank in Nairobi’s Industrial Area on Thursday, with a woman allegedly relaying their movements to accomplices before the car break-in.
No arrests have been made in either case as of publication, deepening concerns over rising insecurity in the two counties. Police have not yet issued a statement on the Ruaka robbery.
