A team of police officers who were involved in the shooting of Pakistan journalist Arshad Sharif surrendered their weapons as part of investigations into the tragedy.
A team investigating the incident wants to also establish if there was any other shooter in the drama following the shooting and injury of one of the General Service Unit officers involved in the drama.
The team will also question the owners of Ammodump Kwenia Shooting Range where Sharif had been for the better part of Sunday October 23.
It is not clear what he was doing there. It has also emerged his driver at the time of the incident Khurram Ahmed is a brother to the owner of the range Waqar Ahmed.
Khurram called his brother after the shooting and informed him of the incident before he instructed him to drive with him to Tinga shopping centre for first aid.
He is also among persons of interest in the probe, police said.
One of the officers involved in the shooting Corporal Kelvin Mutuku is admitted in hospital with a bullet injury.
The corporal of police had an injury in the left palm and he claimed he was shot at before he and his colleagues opened fire at Sharif’s car as it approached a roadblock they had erected.
This prompted the subsequent shooting at the four wheel drive Toyota VX car which left Sharif dead.
He told police the team of four officers drove from their GSU training camp to the site where the shooting happened after they were informed there was a carjacked while Mercedes Benz that was missing but had been sighted in Kiserian area.
They then erected the roadblock using stones, parked their Toyota Landcruiser few meters away with the lights on and waited for the car to arrive if any.
According to the officer, a caller informed them there was a car racing towards them from Leremit towards Kamukuru direction.
And few minutes later, the car carrying Sharif and his driver arrived there and drove past the said roadblock even after seeing the police car’s lights on there, he said.
He claimed they tried to stop the car but were shot at prompting the fatal shooting.
Khurram drove few kilometers ahead and stopped the car at the entrance of the home of his brother after realizing Sharif had died out of bleeding.
It was then that police arrived at the scene and interrogated him before moving the body to the mortuary.
The officers searched the car but did not find any weapon.
Police headquarters said the Independent Policing Oversight Authority had taken over the case.
IPOA said it had dispatched a Rapid Response team to the area following the alleged ‘mistaken identity’ shooting of Sharif.
Ann Makori, IPOA’s chairperson said the authority has started looking into the matter and will recommend prosecution of those found capable.
“Our Rapid Response team has been dispatched to look into the matter,” said Makori during a press briefing on Monday.
The officers will take the weapons for ballistic tests to establish which one was used and if there was a different one that hit Mutuku.
Sharif was allegedly shot dead along the Nairobi-Magadi highway after the vehicle he was travelling in was flagged down by police at a roadblock.
The National Police Service (NPS) spokesman Bruno Shioso said Sharif was in the company of Khurram who was driving the vehicle.
“NPS regrets to announce an incident that occurred last night along Kwenia farm/ Kamukuru marram road within Magadi, Kajiado where a foreigner national namely Arshad Mohammed Sharif, a Pakistani national aged 50 years was fatally wounded by a police officer while a passenger in a motor vehicle KDG 200M,” said Shioso
Shioso said the incident happened after a circulation from Pangani police station of a stolen motor vehicle after which officers trailing the motor vehicle alerted police in Magadi who erected a road barrier.
“Deceased’s motor vehicle came upon the police barrier which they drove through. It is then that they were shot at, fatally injuring the late Arshad Mohammed Sharif,” said Shioso.
The IPOA team is working with the local officers in their probe.
They were scheduled to take further statements from the officers involved in the shooting and visit the shooting range the deceased had been.
This will form part of their probe into the incident. The body of Sharif was flown to Pakistan on Tuesday morning.
Ammodump highlights its status as a major recce site for security personnel looking to hone their shooting skills.
“We specialize in Defense and Security equipment. Ammodump was formed in 2015 by a group of likeminded individuals who sought to combine best-in-class brands, assets and people within the complex risk management industry.”
Our efforts to get a comment from Waqar were fruitless.
