Celebrated cop stares at life imprisonment for wildlife trafficking

Nairobi, KENYA. One of the country’s most prolific killer cops is staring at a possibility of spending life in prison after he was convicted for wildlife trafficking offences and abuse of a government firearm.

Corporal Henry Mokua Onsongo popularly known as Masai was celebrated and revered in equal measure for his extrajudicial executions of hardcore criminals and brutality while dealing with budding ones.

But he is now awaiting sentencing for the offences that attract life imprisonment and an alternative fine of up to Sh20 million.

In his days as the lead SPIV officer in crime-prone areas of Nairobi including in all Mukuru slums, Embakasi and Eastlands areas where he served, Masai was celebrated for killing most dangerous criminals he usually traced and fatally shot in “deadly shootouts” and hideouts.

Cornered in South B shopping centre

His troubles, however, started on March 9, 2015, when he was cornered in South B shopping centre by Kenya Wildlife Service officers who had been tracing him with intelligence that he was dealing with wildlife trophies.

He was found with a piece of a Rhino horn weighing 600 grams and valued at Sh1.2 million inside his car after one of the KWS officers posed as a buyer in a well-planned and meticulously executed dragnet.

In circumstances that would lead to his successful prosecution and conviction for the serious offences, Masai pulled out his Ceska Pistol and threatened the KWS officers and a dangerous confrontation ensued until his seniors from Industrial Area police station arrived at the scene and disarmed him.

This confrontation where Masai **ed his gun and threatened to shoot the KWS officers sired a charge of misuse of a government firearm and obstructing officers on their duties both of which he was also convicted.

And chief magistrate Joyce Gandani of Kibera law courts who found him guilty as charged stopped in the middle of delivering her judgment to confirm Masai was not armed.

Masai was facing a total of four charges: possession of wildlife trophy, dealing in wildlife trophy, obstructing persons in execution of their duties, and using a government firearm for an unlawful purpose.

In the counts of possession and dealing with wildlife trophy, Masai was charged alongside businessman Eliud Wanyonyi and Richard Ngeleka Kalatanda and was convicted jointly with Wanyonyi.

During his trial and after conviction, Masai maintained innocence and claimed he was on duty.

But his seniors at the Industrial Area police station where he headed the SPIV team and Kwa Reuben police post under the same station where he was the deputy in charge and the in-charge of armoury confirmed he was off duty at the time he was arrested.

In mitigation, Masai pleaded for leniency as he has a family and four children entirely dependent on him and he has not been under any employment as he has been under interdiction since he was charged.

Sentence on the two will be passed Monday 10 August 2020.

Link to the 1st session of the AGM 2020

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1J5bGmkQDVQ6RyA5CBkDihpSN-_f4m6ge/view?usp=sharing

Link to 2nd session

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1VgsIBm8-rZ5oZhFp0wlO9MNrpU2NnOwc/view?usp=sharing

2. Judges’ course:

Title: Financial Investigations a Practical Approach - From Planning to Action.

 

Course Start Date: Wed, 1 July 2020 - End Date: Fri, 14 August 2020

 

Closing Date for Registration: Wed, 15 July 2020

 

Introduction

In May 2020 we started engaging our ARINSA family to take online courses. This was done to take advantage of the work from home modalities and travel restrictions that had been put in place by several governments in the Southern African region during this COVID pandemic. UNODC Global e-learning is running several e-learning courses via the ARINSA website and this will continue into the coming months. During each month we will be focusing on a specific topic. The focus for the month of May has been “Introduction to Money Laundering”. In the month of July, the focus will be on “Financial Investigations: Search and Seizures”.  The month of August will focus on “prosecuting money laundering asset forfeiture cases” while September will be for the judiciary. Experts will follow up with live online interactive sessions where the knowledge and skills obtained from the e-learning courses will be further strengthened and enhanced. Participants will have an opportunity to clarify and ask questions during the live sessions and through discussion forums.

The 2^nd module starting in July, is a follow-up to the 1^st module which ran from 1 May 2020 to 21 June 2020. To fully understand this second module  participants are encouraged to go through the courses of the 1^st module which is accessible through the ARINSA website – MLC course. This 2^nd module covers a number of topics and participants will be encouraged to take more courses than the prescribed mandatory courses to obtain a wider view on the subject matter.  

 

 

Structure

The second module has 13 courses, which must be completed by the end of the 2^nd week of August. Each course takes approximately 1-2 hours. Participants will be required to take at

least three courses per week and four courses in the last week. After each week, participants will be required to complete the following:

1.       Upload certificates of completion (obtained from the UNODC Global E-Learning)

2.       Write a short summary of what you learnt during the week of not more than 200 words   

          in the text box labeled “Online Text”

3.       Complete a brief evaluation questionnaire 

4.       Participate in an online webinar

Four (4) live webinar sessions will be done to cover the courses, all of which will be mandatory towards the awarding of a final course certificate. After the lifting of the COVID-19 travel restrictions, UNODC will organize training sessions which will build upon the foundations laid in these courses. Completion of this module will be considered when inviting and sponsoring attendance to future in-person courses.

UNODC therefore kindly requests all contact points, heads of departments and colleagues to spread this message as widely as possible to all possible participants within the asset forfeiture space and all other institutions that are linked to money laundering and financial crime to avail themselves to take these courses.

Registration

In order to register for e-learning, course participants need to be a part of the ARINSA website platform. ARINSA website membership application forms can be obtained from Yeukai.Tizora@un.org. Upon completion, forms must be scanned and sent to Yeukai and copying arinsa@un.org, for registration. Kindly note that only typed or clearly hand-written (in CAPITAL LETTERS) forms are accepted. Photographs of these forms may also suffice. Please send an email to the above addresses in case of any challenges registering to the platform. Please Note that: Yahoo email addresses are blocking emails from our system therefore use alternative email addresses.

Those who are already part of the ARINSA platform but have forgotten login credentials should send an email request clearly stated “forgotten password” to Yeukai.Tizora@un.org and copy arinsa@un.org.

 

 

Once you have obtained the ARINSA website login credentials, enroll yourself for the e-learning course by following the link here (https://arinsa.org/course/view.php?id=59),

 

Or else,

if you are in the ARINSA platform go to “LEARNING -> FISZ -> under the heading FISZ Self Enroll –  The enrollment key is “fisz2020” -> Click Enroll Me”

Once enrolled on the FISZ course, now register yourself as a “NEW USER”  at the UNODC GLOBAL eLearning website by following the link here ( https://golearn.unodc.org/lms/login/index.php) . Once you successfully register and login to the UNODC Global website, send your full names and login credentials that you have used by email to kudzai.chinoda@un.org and copy arinsa@un.org. Existing students or those who have already registered for the previous course do not need to be enrolled again on the UNODC GLOBAL eLearning website.

The deadline for online all Registrations for the July course will be CoB, Wednesday, 14 July 2020.

There are limited spaces so, NO participants will be registered or enrolled after this date!

We hope that you will find this to be worthwhile and enriching to your careers as well as of those of the others.

REMEMBER LET US LEAVE THE CRIMINALS WITH NOWHERE TO HIDE!!

All the best and let us keep safe.

 

Best Regards,

The NPA's Sipho Ngwema said investigators acted quickly to secure the money that remained. "We placed our focus on securing the stolen money as quickly as possible. Law enforcement agencies have come together to form an oversight structure which seeks out Covid-19-related corruption and that is how this incident was picked up," he said.

EU lists Mauritius as high-risk country for money laundering

May 2020

In Summary

• About a fortnight ago, the European Commission (EC), the executive branch of the EU, put Mauritius on its list of high-risk countries with strategic deficiencies in their anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing frameworks.
• Signals that Mauritius could be blacklisted started earlier this year when the county was put on the FATF’s “grey list” if they did not curb the mushrooming of terror funding and money laundering activities.
• Several investors in East Africa, like commercial and investment banks and insurance firms, have registered firms in Mauritius because of the tax benefits, eliciting calls for investigations of the double taxation agreements.

By JAMES ANYANZWA
More by this Author

Companies operating in Mauritius face a test of integrity after the European Union included the island on its revised list of high-risk jurisdictions for money laundering and terror funding.

Mauritius has been a popular financial haven for the region’s wealthy individuals, with several companies registering their subsidiaries in Port Louis mostly due to its favourable tax regime with corporate and export taxes of 15 per cent and three per cent, respectively.

The country also allows a 100 per cent foreign ownership with no capital gains tax.

However, about a fortnight ago, the European Commission (EC), the executive branch of the EU, put Mauritius on its list of high-risk countries with strategic deficiencies in their anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing frameworks.

In a statement on its website, EC said the revised list will now be submitted to the European Parliament and Council for approval within one month (with a possible one-month extension) and the country status of the new listing will take effect on October 1.

The methodology takes into account the interaction between the EU and the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) process, an enhanced engagement with third countries and consultation with member states.

The FATF is an inter-governmental body that sets anti-money laundering standards.

Signals that Mauritius could be blacklisted started earlier this year when the country was put on the FATF’s “grey list” if they did not curb the mushrooming of terror funding and money laundering activities.

The EU’s revised list for high risk countries considered developments that have taken place at the international level since 2018.

The new list also includes Botswana, Ghana, Zimbabwe, Bahamas, Barbados, Cambodia, Jamaica, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nicaragua, and Panama.

Countries which have been delisted include Ethiopia, Tunisia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Guyana, Lao People's Democratic Republic and Sri Lanka.

East Africa has recently seen a surge in investments from Mauritius, with banking, insurance, agriculture, telecoms, trade and the oil and gas sectors receiving most of the capital.

In the region, Kenya has attracted the largest number of investors: Data shows that Mauritian companies have invested over Ksh10 billion ($100 million) in the country, mostly in financial services and the sugar sector.

Several investors in East Africa, like commercial and investment banks and insurance firms, have registered firms in Mauritius because of the tax benefits, eliciting calls for investigations of the double taxation agreements.

In April last year, Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta met Mauritian Prime Minister Pravind Kumar Jugnauth in Mauritius and they agreed to jointly support private sector investments by reducing the bureaucratic procedures required to set up businesses.

Read More: https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/business/Mauritius-financial-haven/2560-5556212-ku92fh/index.html

(Edited by Kudzai Chinoda - original submission Wednesday, 3 June 2020, 5:05 PM)

A new report published today by the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organised Crime presents the most extensive survey of heroin markets, prices and flows in East and Southern Africa ever published.

The report examines heroin markets in Tanzania, Mozambique, South Africa, eSwatini, Lesotho, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Malawi and Namibia.

A steady flow of heroin has gradually seeped across the region, and this has had a significant impact on the many secondary towns found along the continent’s transcontinental road networks. These places, in turn, have spawned their own small local heroin markets, and become waypoints in rendering sustainable the spread of heroin across the region.

The impact has been significant and the emerging drug markets represent credible threats to the development and security of the regions institutions and structures.

A copy of the report can be donwloaded here.

The fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic is having profound impacts on society and the economy, and it will also influence and shape organized crime and illicit markets. The institutional response to the pandemic and the consequent reshaping of socio-economic norms worldwide will affect how criminal networks operate, as well as the nature of law-enforcement responses to them.

A new policy brief from the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organised Crime examines the impact of COVID-19 on crime: This is the first in a series and every week as part of our #CovidCrimeWatch, we will publish a series of articles about the pandemic and organised crime.

More in the links above and here: https://globalinitiative.net/crime-contagion-impact-covid-crime/

(Edited by Kudzai Chinoda - original submission Thursday, 26 March 2020, 3:09 PM)

DPP, EACC hand over Ksh.2B of corruption proceeds to Covid-19 emergency fund

By Francis Gachuri For Citizen Digital

Published on:  April 7, 2020 11:31 (EAT)

The Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) and the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) on Tuesday presented a donation of Ksh.2 billion to the National Treasury as part of efforts to beef up the Covid-19 emergency fund.

DPP Noordin Haji and EACC boss Twalib Mbarak, while issuing the dummy cheque to Treasury Cabinet Secretary Ukur Yatani, said the funds were part of recovered proceeds of crime such as corruption and money laundering.

DPP Haji said the prosecution fund established last year had so far netted Ksh.2.9 billion, from which the Ksh.2 billion presented to Treasury had been retrieved to aid in the fight against the novel coronavirus.

“We have various institutions dealing with corruption. A lot more money is out there but because cases are not complete, we can’t use it. We have to wait for the cases to be complete,” noted Haji.

Twalib, on his part, said: “This money is a product of plea bargaining. There are some cases ongoing, we can’t use the money because of pending appeals. But we are confident we will recover this money.”

The EACC CEO added that the war on corruption is still ongoing, further expressing confidence that it will bear fruits and more public resources illegally held in terms of land and property will be recovered and reverted to the government.

CS Yatani commended the two State agencies for the move, also urging others to follow suit and channel some funds to the Covid-19 emergency kitty.

He also revealed that the Treasury had received a pledge of Ksh.7 billion from the Sports fund as well as other individuals, organizations and State agencies.

“We are revising the budget and we won’t spare any item. We are suspending some projects to address the current situation and recovery of the income. We are cutting on some expenditure that we can push to the next financial year,” he said.

“I may not be able to give you the specifics on the budget for Covid-19 because it’s a moving target, but the figures are massive. Some of these proposals are outrageous, we may not be able to finance them. Even with the prevailing circumstances, we must run a fiscally sound economy.”