A businesswoman in Nairobi is in trouble after she was nabbed having withdrawn money mistakenly sent to her M-Pesa account.
Elizabeth Karimi Muthoni is now facing two years in jail after she pleaded guilty after being arraigned on Monday, August 16.
She faced the charge of hiding money sent in error in contravention of Section 34 of the Computers and Cyber Crimes Act of 2018.
"Any person(s) who hides or holds electronic messages, electronic payments, debit card details sent in error commit an offense," the law states.
A sum of Ksh271,200 was sent to her M-Pesa account by Bakar Hussein Mohamed in Kitengela, Kajiado County, on July 14.
Appearing before Kibera Senior Principal Magistrate Philip Mutua on Monday, she admitted withdrawing the money.
The agent account is owned by Muthoni, whose business is based in Kitengela.
A local bank had agreed to reverse the transaction and send back the money to Mohammed’s account but failed since the money had been withdrawn by the accused.
She told the court that she withdrew a portion of the money and was in talks with Mohammed on how she would pay him back.
The court hit her with a fine of Ksh200,000 after she pleaded guilty to the charges and an alternative of two years in prison.
Margaret Njeri of Embu County was the first victim of the newly introduced law meant to improve the efficiency of the popular Mpesa service in Kenya.
In 2018, Njeri was charged after she withdrew Ksh27,140 that had been sent to her M-Pesa account by mistake.
She subsequently refused to return the funds to the sender prompting a court case where she was found guilty and jailed for six months.
The mobile money platform has been hailed around the world as a revolutionary technology that has enabled millions of Kenyans to send and receive money at the touch of a button.
