A General Service Unit (GSU) officer was on Friday, February 3, saved from an irate mob by his colleagues attached to the Kisii Central Police Station.
The Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) on Wednesday, February 7, stated that the officers who were on patrol found the armed suspect under a hail of hefty blows.
Upon inquiry, the officers were informed that the suspect had robbed a smartphone from a Kisii University student.
"On frisking the injured suspect, we found the phone. He was arrested and escorted to the station," the detectives stated.
Further investigations linked the officer to another robbery incident within the same locality.
Detectives in the area had been pursuing an armed gang of three who on January 2, 2024, robbed Ksh40,000 from a mini supermarket situated at Corner Mbaya in Kisii.
The officer was said to have been part of the gang that wreaked havoc at the supermarket.
"The incident was captured by CCTV cameras showing three robbers who had partly covered their faces, two of whom were armed, one with an AK47 and the other with a pistol. The rifle bearer had police fatigues on, but it was not apparent that he was a police officer," the DCI stated.
"An identification parade was conducted where the supermarket owner successfully identified the suspect as one of the robbers who accosted him," DCI added.
The suspect was placed under police custody as he continued to recuperate at a Kisii hospital pending interrogation and arraignment for robbery with violence.
In a similar incident three months ago, an angry mob lynched two men accused of robbing pedestrians in the Pangani area along Thika highway in Nairobi.
The two suspects were cornered after attempting to snatch a smartphone from a victim at a shopping centre.
Police officers from Pangani Police Station rushed to the scene but unfortunately found the lifeless bodies of the two robbers lying on the ground.
