Woman who’d spent 15yrs at Shimo La Tewa for theft to start another 35-yr jail term after being found guilty of robbery with violence

A 62-year-old woman accused of engaging in robbery with violence has been sentenced to 35 years in jail by the Loitoktok Law Courts.

Joyce Wairimu Kariuki was found guilty of employing violence to steal motor vehicles, especially lorries, from different people in Nakuru, Nairobi and Mombasa areas between 2018 and 2019.

Kariuki is a former convict, who served 15 years in prison for six different offences, including stealing, forgery, attempted theft, among other crimes. She was first arrested in 2005, prosecuted and declared guilty by the then-Kwale Senior Resident Magistrate D.O. Ogembo.

Kariuki had been imprisoned at the Shimo La Tewa Maximum GK Prison in Mombasa.

The convict had, in 2008, filed an appeal at the High Court in Mombasa, but her application was dismissed by Justice M. Muya, who, on November 14, 2013, ruled that Kariuki’s appeal was “convoluted, disjointed and without merit”.

Following her arrest early last year, Kariuki was arraigned at the Loitoktok Law Courts on April 23, 2019.

The DCI said following a string of car thefts in different parts of the country, they “narrowed down on Joyce Wairimu Kariuki, whom the thefts revolved [around] despite having been released from Shimo La Tewa Prison after completing a 15-year jail term”.