Details of the dramatic carjacking and kidnapping of car dealers in Juja
Police are holding four suspects linked to a carjacking and abduction of two car dealers.
Detectives raided a compound in Juja, Kiambu County, and arrested four suspects who lured them by posing as customers.
The four, including a young woman, were arrested from their hideout almost four days after they abducted the dealers and locked them in a building from where they demanded Sh5 million ransom from family and friends of the two victims.
The four were later positively identified as those behind the drama at a parade staged at Juja police station.
They had earlier escaped from a scene where the carjacked vehicle had been crushed by a motorcycle in the Kahawa Wendani area.
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A police report narrating the convoluted ordeal revealed that on December 1, 2023, a car dealer identified as Kennedy Kimuhu Gitau received a call from a car broker named Brian Karanja informing him that there was a potential buyer based in Juja looking for a vehicle make Prado.
The duo then drove from a showroom along Kiambu Road and headed to Juja to meet with the interested buyer, Robert Sifuna Wekesa.
Upon being acquainted, the three went for a driving test at Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT). Then they stopped in front of a gated house in Juja, where they all alighted from the car.
In an abrupt turn of events, three men on a motorcycle are said to have appeared and ordered Gitau and Karanja into the house as the client, Wekesa, drove the car into the compound.
On December 4, two men and a woman tied up the kidnapped duo, bundled them into the Prado, and headed to an unidentified destination.
It wasn’t until the vehicle reached Juja Equity Bank that it hit another motor vehicle and sped off.
The driver of the accosted vehicle is said to have chased the Prado when one suspect fired two rounds in the air at Kimbo.
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According to witnesses, during the chase, the car rammed into a rail and got stuck there before armed occupants, two men and a woman, jumped out.
The suspects are said to have taken a motorcycle to escape the scene at gunpoint and ordered him off before they took its charge and rode off.
Residents rushed to the Prado and found the two men tied up and locked inside.
The families of the victims had posted an appeal online saying that two dealers who had delivered the car to a customer were missing after a suspected carjacking and kidnapping.
The police revealed that the suspects, aged between 27 and 33, were nabbed from an isolated house believed to be rented near the Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT) and that police were also looking for the owner as investigations intensified.
They added that police are still hunting for three other accomplices at large and appealed to the public to come forward with information that could lead to their arrest.
The suspects were arraigned in court on Tuesday, and police asked for more time to complete their investigations.