The owner of the deadly Embakasi gas plant which claimed seven lives and left over 300 injured was Wednesday released on bail.
Principal Magistrate Dolphina Alego on Wednesday released David Kimathi on a cash bail of Sh500,000 or an alternative bond of Sh2 million.
This is after Kimathi vehemently opposed the investigation officer’s application seeking 14 more days to detain him.
“Are they asking for more days to keep him so that they can open more space for them to investigate?” defense lawyer Kirathe Wandungi posed.
The investigating officer, Isaac Kariuki told the court that Kimathi had not been cooperative hindering the completion of investigations.
Kariuki told the court that on several occasions Kimathi had refused to record statements, which are a major part of the police inquiry because of the unavailability of his counsel.
“We had attempts to record statements of the suspect…… a team went to Embakasi on February 21 but they were not able to record the statement because counsel was not available,” he said.
The court heard that Kimathi had tried writing an email to the Kenya Revenue Authority while in custody.
Kariuki argued that he was weary of him being released on bail as he will interfere with witnesses by virtue of him having been an employee of KRA at one time and an engineer.
The investigators are also yet to engage experts from the Engineering Board of Kenya, NEMA, EPRA, Kenya Bureau of Standards and fire brigade Nairobi City county as part of the probe into the incident.
The court was told that the officers are yet to record statements from 30 more victims who have been identified and are neighbors.
Kariuki argued that they need the suspect for purposes of visiting the scene of crime for reconstruction.
However, Wandungi opposed the same saying it is not the suspect’s responsibility to help the investigating officers to carry out their mandates.
The court heard that the officers were yet to obtain clearance to visit Tanzania and Uganda to establish the sources of purported gas which was in the trucks that exploded.
In the meantime Kimathi is to be detained at Capital hill police station if he is unable to pay bail/bond granted by the court.
Three NEMA officials who were detained alongside Kimathi have since been released from custody after the High Court found that it was not necessary for them to be detained pending investigations.
The officials had moved to the High Court through judicial review challenging the issue of continued detention.
The suspects are being investigated on cases of murder, conspiracy to commit a felony, negligent act and abuse of office.
The Embakasi explosion happened on February 1.
A lorry carrying a gas cylinders exploded in Embakasi district at about 11:30 pm resulting to a “igniting ball of fire” according to the police.
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