Police in Kangema, Muranga County have arrested an assistant chief and launched a manhunt for another on allegations of working in cahoots with a police officer to actualise a minor’s sexual abuse.
The administrators, one from Tuthu and another Wanjerere area, are said to have kept watch as the police officer defiled a Form 3 girl in Aberdare Forest at Mwisho wa Raha area on Tuesday night (July 14).
An elderly woman is said to have seen the officer luring the 16-year-old into the forest as the assistant chiefs kept guard by the roadside. She raised an alarm, attracting villagers who stormed the scene and caught one of the chiefs.
The officer and his other accomplice escaped into the forest as the angry locals beat up the other chief before police arrived and took him away.
The victim told police that her alleged abuser had asked to meet her near Aberdare Forest.
“He said I had sneered at him, and, therefore, wanted to iron out issues with me. When I went to meet him at the Aberdare Forest, he asked me to accompany him deeper into the thicket, assuring me that nothing bad would happen because the assistant chiefs were there to protect me,” the girl recounted as quoted by K24 Digital.
She said while inside the thicket, the officer plucked leaves from a tree, spread them on the ground and forced her to lie on them.
“He then ordered me to undress. He also took off his clothes, unwrapped a condom, wore it and forcefully penetrated me. While in the act, he removed the condom from his manhood and continued sexually abusing me without protection,” she said.
The minor was taken to a Kangema hospital, where a test confirmed that she had been defiled.
Area locals took to the streets Wednesday morning to protest against the incident, accusing police officers of shielding their colleague, “who has been ruining our children’s lives”.
Education Cabinet Secretary Prof. George Magoha, who toured Murang’a County on Wednesday, condemned the act and assured residents that the suspects would be brought to book.
