Billionaire businessman Ashok Doshi may soon be let off the hook, with the Director of Public Prosecutions reviewing the file in which he is charged with land fraud.
His lawyer Noel Okwach on Monday told trial magistrate Lucas Onyina that Doshi had asked for a review of the charges with the possibility of dropping the criminal proceedings altogether.
“My client wrote to the DPP on December 13, 2024, seeking a review and he responded on December 19, 2024, saying the file had been recalled from the DCI for a review of the evidence,” Okwach said.
The lawyer said the DPP had indicated a possibility of the charges being dropped.
He asked for a mention in two weeks for the court to be updated on the progress of the review.
Doshi and his company, Magnum Properties Limited, were in 2023 charged with four counts of land fraud, forging land documents and forcefully taking over land worth millions of shillings located along Processional Way in Nairobi.
The charge sheet showed Doshi, who is a director at Doshi Group of Companies, allegedly hatched the plan to grab the land owned by Greenview Lodge Limited in 1992 when he allegedly forged a stamp duty from the Ministry of Lands to claim ownership.
In count one, Doshi, lawyer Harith Sheth and Magnum Properties Limited jointly faced a charge of conspiracy to defraud where the prosecution alleged that they forged a government stamp duty valued at Sh1.2 million to register a land title in 1992.
“Between May 14, 1992 and September 2, 1992 at Ardhi House, Nairobi, jointly conspired with intent to defraud the government of Kenya Sh1.2 million by fraudulent means by forging a receipt that was meant for stamp duty,” the charge sheet reads.
Sheth was not charged and has never pleaded to the charges after he secured conservatory orders from the High Court halting his prosecution.
Doshi faced a second count of making a document without authority, where it was alleged he made the stamp duty purporting it to be genuine and valid.
In count three, the businessman was charged with forgery.
The charge stated that he forged a receipt for the Ministry of Lands while lying that it was a genuine document issued and signed by the Commissioner of Lands.
The businessman faced another charge of forcibly taking possession and retaining the land in dispute.
“On September 5, 2002, at Processional Way in Nairobi county... held possession of the said land in a manner likely to cause of breach of peace against Greenview Lodge who is entitled to own the land,” the charge reads.
Doshi denied the charges and was released on a Sh500,000 bail and ordered to deposit his passport in court.
That was in April 2023. The case has never proceeded owing to High Court orders that suspended the proceedings.
On Monday, the matter came up for mention before Onyina where the court was to be briefed on the outcome of the High Court case.
Lawyers representing Harith Sheth informed the magistrate that the High Court orders were still in place and that further directions will be issued on March 18.
Okwach, however, said the court could still give an earlier date for the DPP to decide whether to proceed or drop the case.
Onyina, however, ruled that the matter could not proceed until the High Court gives its orders on March 18.
He subsequently directed that the case be mentioned on March 19.
