A Nairobi court has released three Congolese nationals and three Kenyans suspected to be involved in a Sh 70 million gold scam on bail.
Senior Principal Magistrate Dolphina Alego granted the suspects a cash bail of Sh 500,000 each. They will also be required to provide two contact persons each.
The suspects are Nfundiko Kamira Jean Marie (Congolese), Alan Zaphenia Onyango, Edward Leonard Ochieng, Shem Omollo Onyango, Peter Lukabaya Mulamba(Congolese), and Ibrahim Nsangou(Congolese).
The prosecution had made an application to have the suspects detained for 14 days to allow police to conclude investigations.
However, the court ruled that there were no compelling reasons to warrant the detention.
According to the custodial application, the complainants made a police report that the six had obtained from them USD 546,000 (Apprx Sh 70 million).
The complainants, Ramadhan Suleiman Mohamed and George William Betoka reported that on diverse dates between 6th and 10th March 2025 the six respondents had with them six metallic boxes with nuggets purported to be gold weighing 305 Kgs, 2 weighing machine(one big one small) and an electronic gold tester gun.
Others items used to lure the complainants included a dust coat branded Ministry of mining, job card purportedly from Ministry of Mining indicating employment number 00427, assorted documents bearing the logo of Ministry of Mining, numerical seals yellow in colour, white helmet and unidentified liquid in a small jerrican for use in the course of cheating.
According to Chief Inspector Leah Ambiche, the buyer Sudmet Global (FZE) UAE intended to buy 150 Kgs of gold from Jean Marie.
“The 1st respondent and the buyer through the representatives agreed on a purchase price of USD 65,000 per Kilogram,” the investigator submitted.
CI Ambiche told the court that from the footage obtained from the scene, Jean Marie introduced the representatives of the buyer to his agent, Alan Onyango.
They were allegedly shown gold samples at a residence in Muthaiga where the 3rd respondent ( Edward Ochieng) was actively involved in the sampling process and the 4th respondent (Shem Onyango) was the purported mining official from Ministry of Mining.
Chief Inspector Ambiche added that Shem Onyango tested the alleged gold nugget samples with his electronic gold tester gun confirming its purity.
It is alleged that the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th respondents then took the representatives of the buyer to the Ministry of Mining offices where the sample was tested and assay report dated 4th March 2025.
According to court documents, on the same day the 1st and 2nd respondents gave the complainants 7kgs of gold as collateral, which they were adviced to keep at MySafe Place at Sarit Centre. Both parties (buyer’s side and the seller’s side) were issued with the key to the safe.
Afterwards, Jean Marie and Alan Onyango then introduced the complainants to Kristal Commodities Group Limited, an alleged licensed dealer with Ministry of Mining & Shipping company that was to prepare the paper work for shipping the gold consignment to Dubai.
On the same day, the shipping company through the two respondents gave the complainants an invoice of USD 546,000 dated 4th March, 2025 for the said paperwork.
The court heard that Jean Marie and his team preferred to be paid in either USD or cash but the complainants recommended the buyer to pay via wire transfer.
CI Ambiche said that when the buyer did a wire transfer to the account number of Kristal Commodities Group Limited, it failed to go through.
“On diverse dates between 6th and 10th March 2025, the buyer through his representative, Mohamed paid the invoiced amount of USD 546,000 which was received by Jean Marie in the presence of his team members. (the transaction is captured on video). They were then issued with sales receipts.
Now, Jean Marie was supposed to ship the 150Kgs consignment to Dubai but never did. They also found out that the collateral gold at Mysafe was just stones.
The investigator said that in order to nub the perpetrators, the complainants planned the another sale for the purchase of 500 Kgs of gold.
Seeing a sweeter deal, the complainant was issued an invoice from SKR Logistics Limited for Sh 2,680,800 on 17th April 2025.
In this deal, Jean Marie allegedly introduced Peter Mulamba as the seller as per the new sale agreement.
As the deal progressed, the six suspects were arrested in Spring Valley, Nairobi, where they had set up another gold sale.
The investigating officer told the court she needed time to extract the original video footages capturing the events from the complainants’ phones for forensic analysis.
She also needed time to extract mobile phone data from the phones of the respondents and obtain reports from the Ministry of Mining, BRS, Immigration department among others.
While releasing the respondents on bail, the court also ordered them to deposit their passports in court.
The case will be mentioned on 26th May 2025.
