Man admits to stealing wheelbarrow – VIDEO
A man is battling theft charges after a wheelbarrow he borrowed was reportedly impounded by the Nairobi Metropolitan Services (NMS) officers who he says are demanding Sh20,000 to release it.
Nelson Omangwa Ondieki was charged with stealing the wheelbarrow from Nelson Mutua, who uses it for his maize roasting business in Kangemi slums in Nairobi.
Ondieki was charged with stealing the wheelbarrow worth Sh7000 on October 8 and he pleaded guilty to the charges before senior principal magistrate Esther Bhoke of Kibera law courts.
He said he’d borrowed the wheelbarrow to use after he got a job to carry some pieces of firewood in his neighbourhood in the Waruku area.
The court heard that Ondieki disappeared never to be seen after borrowing Mutua’s wheelbarrow until November 4 when Mutua spotted and arrested him with the help of members of the public.
He was previously held at Kitsuru police post before being transferred to Spring Valley police station.
“I met some kanjo (NMS) workers who asked me where I was taking the things I was carrying before they took away the wheelbarrow. I went to him (Mutua) and told him what had happened but he said he doesn’t want to see me without his wheelbarrow,” Ondieki said.
“I have tried talking to him since Thursday but he insists he doesn’t want to see me, he wants his trolley. But I admit the charges.”
Bhoke scheduled the case for a hearing despite Ondieki persistently insisting he had pleaded guilty because the narrative he gave after the facts of the case were read out to him amounted to denying theft charges.
He was released on a bond of Sh200,000 and an alternative cash bail of Sh7,500.
The case will be mentioned on November 22.