Recovery agency allowed to freeze Ksh 102M held in student’s bank account

By , K24 Digital
On Sat, 27 Nov, 2021 17:15 | 2 mins read
PHOTO/COURTESY

Assets Recovery Agency (ARA) was on Friday, November 26 allowed to freeze Ksh102 million held in a 21-year-old student’s bank account.

This comes just seven days after ARA moved to court seeking to have the bank account holding the car frozen, saying that such a huge payment could be proceeds of crime.

On Friday, a gazette notice revealed that the money had been frozen for a period of 90 days.

A ruling issued by Justice Esther Maina said that noone will be allowed to withdraw the money in the account.

“Preservation orders be and are hereby issued prohibiting the respondent, her employees, agents, servants or any other persons acting on their behalf from transacting, withdrawing, transferring or dealing in any manner howsoever in respect of any profits or benefits derived or accrued from the funds specified,” the order issued by Justice Maina read.

Felesta Nyamathira Njoroge, a student at Nairobi Technical Institute, told officials attached to ARA that she was given the money by her Belgian boyfriend as a gift.

However, the explanation did not satisfy the officials, who moved to court seeking to have the account frozen before the money is wired elsewhere or withdrawn.

What caught the eyes of the officials from the organization is the fact that the account was opened on August 2 and the money was channelled to it two days later.

“There are reasonable grounds to believe that the funds held in the account in the name of the respondent, are illicit funds in which the respondent is involved in a money-laundering scheme designed to conceal and disguise the nature, source location and movement of the funds,” ARA said in court documents.

ARA officials believe that if the account will not be frozen then Njoroge will continue enjoying the money which is believed to be a proceed of crime.

In the court documents, ARA said that the first deposit of money was Ksh25, 803, 756 which was sent to the account on August 4, 2021.

The second deposit of ksh25, 803, 756 was made on August 5 with the third and fourth deposits of ksh25, 242,756 and ksh25 579, 356 respectively being wired on August 6.

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