A lawyer has been charged alongside his client with land fraud related charges.
Allan Mbugua Njuguna and lawyer John Kiumi Wambugu are accused of conspiring to defraud Bunmax Investments Limited of their land LR 209/8524/129, IR 91699 by a executing land sales agreement dated 25th March 2017 between Bunmax and Farasi Marketing Limited by falsely pretending that the said agreement was executed by genuine and valid directors of Bunmax, a fact they knew to be false.
They are alleged to have committed the offence on 25th March 2017 at Wambugu and Muriuki advocates office at at Lonrho house in Nairobi, jointly with others not before court.
Njuguna was also charged with personification by presenting himself as a director of Bunmax Inv.
He is also charged with forging a land transfer form between the two companies purporting it to be genuine.
The court also heard that on 13th July 2017 at Arthi House in Nairobi, knowingly and fraudulently uttered the forged land transfer form to the Chief Land Registrar purporting it to be genuine and executed BT the directors of the two companies.
The two denied the charges before Chief Magistrate Wendy Kagendo.
Lawyer opposes pleading
The lawyer had opposed pleading to the charges on grounds that he had written to the DPP to review the charges against him.
Wambugu told the court that the charges against him emanated from his discharging his duties as an advocate. He added that the charges against him were yet to be approved by the DPP.
“We want the plea to be deferred for the second accused because charges are yet to be approved by the DPP. Only the charges for 1st accused were approved,” the lawyer said.
The court heard that Wambugu was arrested and released on a police bail of Sh 25,000.
“The charges against second accused were as a result of him discharging his duties as a lawyer. We have written to the DPP to review the facts before he takes plea,” Mbugua’s lawyer added.
However, the prosecution objected the application opposing plea taking.
The prosecution told the court that the charge sheet is not defective neither is there a stay for the same.
“This file was taken to the DPP, the same was perused and was directed the two be charged,” the prosecutor said.
In her ruling, the Magistrate noted that the charge sheet is duly stamped.
“The court notes the transactions were done in 2017 so there has been enough consultation,” the Magistrate said.
She went ahead to direct the two to plead to the charges against them.
Njuguna was granted a bond of Sh 1 million while Wambugu was granted a cash bail of Sh 100,000.
