A man was on Tuesday set free from jail after he spent five years in prison for a crime he never committed.
In a bid to avoid punishment for being late for school, a Standard seven pupil told a lie that cost her uncle five years behind bars.
The pupil told the teacher that she had been defiled by her uncle which prompted him to escalate the matter with the police and had the uncle arrested.
After a case that ran for almost 4 months, the uncle was sentenced to 20 years behind bars.
The Standard reported that AJC was jailed on September 12, 2014, following the testimony by the victim, named CSS (both abbreviated in order to protect the identities of the individuals).
Four years down the line, the ‘victim’ who is now 18-years-old, opened up to her mother about the lie and also wrote a letter to the court explaining how she fabricated lies against her uncle.
“I testified in court and said that I would tell the truth. I was untruthful because I feared. I had been late in school and when I was asked where I was, I told a lie. If I had told the truth, I would have been beaten. It was the teacher who took the matter to the police. When I heard that AJC had been sentenced to 20 years, I felt very bad and that is why I called my mother. AJC has never defiled me,” her letter read in part.
The uncle had paid the girl’s family a visit and had spent only a day with them.
While releasing AJC, high court judge Edward Muriithi ordered that CSS be punished for telling lies under oath in a court of law.
The court heard that the girl decided to come clean to free herself from the guilt that has been tormenting her. She told the judge in her letter that no one had induced her to retract her testimony.
The judge, however, noted that the issue could only be followed up by the Director of Public Prosecution Noordin Haji.
She now risks two years in jail and a fine of Ksh 2,000, or both, according to the law governing oaths and testimonies before a judge or magistrate.
