The year 2023 will go down as one with key convictions for several cases that puzzled the nation in recent years.
The convictions range from defilement to child trafficking, and murder.
One of the notable ones is the conviction and subsequent sentencing of a former Mama Lucy Hospital social worker.
Baby stealer convicted of child trafficking.
Fred Leparan was found guilty in September this year for child trafficking and negligence and sentenced to 35 years in jail a month later.
His co-accused Selina Adundo, also a social worker, was sentenced to two years in jail or pay a fine of Sh300 000.
While sentencing the two, senior principal magistrate Esther Kimilu said Leparan, as a person who had worked for a long in community service, ought to have protected the children.
"He lacks empathy for them and was not remorseful."
"I sentence the first accused as follows, 3 years in count of conspiracy to traffic children, count 2,3, and 4 to 30 years for trafficking three children and count 6 and 7 to two years for child negligence," Magistrate Kimilu ruled.
The court further clarified that Leparan will only serve 25 years in custody and serve 10 years on probation under close supervision.
The magistrate further cautioned that the two should not be subjected to any matter of children.
She ordered the children to be released for adoption.
Conviction and Sentencing of Venezuelan ex-diplomat
Dwight Sagaray became the first ever diplomat to be tried on Kenyan soil and was subsequently jailed for the 2012 murder of Venezuelan envoy Olga Fonseca.
He was convicted in January 2023 along with three Kenyans.
Dwight was handed a 20-year sentence over the murder of Fonseca.
Fonseca was strangled to death on July 26, 2012, less than two weeks after arriving in Kenya to head the diplomatic mission.
Her body was found lying on her bed with a wire cord around her neck, hands, and legs on the night of July 26 and 27 2012. Next to her body was a pair of pliers.
She reported to Kenya on July 15 to replace former ambassador Gerardo Carillo Silva.
In convicting Dwight, Judge Roselyn Korir said the evidence produced in court by the prosecution demonstrated there was an outright conflict between Olga and Dwight.
That glaring conflict according to the Judge provided the motive to eliminate Olga.
The court was able to deduce the hostile and acrimonious relationship between the two through the evidence of the embassy staff.
"I have found their evidence to be credible. They narrated what they saw and experienced. They have no interest in siding with either party," the Judge said.
The court also relied on a confession statement by Moses Kalya, an accused person at the time.
The statement later detailed how Ahmed Omido, Alex Sifuna, Moses Kalya and Mohamed held meetings to discuss the elimination of Fonseca.
Even though Dwight was not named in the confession statement, the court said he must have known of the plot to kill but did nothing about it. Moses was acquitted.
Dwight has since appealed his conviction and sentencing. He terms it illegal and wants the Court of Appeal to overturn it.
He says the trial Judge Roselyn Korir made a mistake by relying on an unsubstantiated procured note alleged to emanate from the Venezuelan ministry concerning waiver of his diplomatic immunity.
He argues the note was not procedurally procured.
According to the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations (1961), all diplomats, under international law, are to be considered not susceptible to lawsuits or prosecution under their host country’s laws.
If they are to be charged, the immunity must first be waived, following a procedure, since they enjoy immunity from criminal proceedings.
Ivy Wangechi axe-murder case
Ivy Wangechi was killed in the most brutal of ways, with an axe and in broad daylight outside the Moi Referral Hospital on April 9, 2019.
His boyfriend Naftali Kinuthia was arrested and tried for her murder.
In convicting him this year, Justice Reuben Githinji noted that although the accused had claimed that the axe he used had been in his car for security reasons that was not the case.
He noted that the axe appeared new and sharpened which proved aforethought malice on the side of the accused in ending Ivy’s life.
The 33-year-old had in his defence confessed to killing her over a love relationship gone sour.
He said he regrets the incident and that he was overwhelmed by anger.
Naftali said he remembers getting an axe from his car to attack Ivy but noted that he was not himself during the events that followed leading to Ivy’s death.
“Looking back, I regret what I did. Even though I was hurt there were other ways I would have used to resolve our differences,” he said.
Naftali was on December 14 sentenced to serve 40 years in jail for the murder of medical student Wangeci.
Justice Stephen Githinji said that the offence committed was brutal and called for a harsh sentence against the accused.
German lands 81 years in jail over child pornography
74-year-old Thomas Scheller might end up dying in prison after he was convicted and sentenced to serve 81 years in jail over several counts of defilement and child pornography
Milimani principal magistrate Caroline Njagi this year sentenced Scheller to 30 years in jail in count one for defilement, counts two and three to 15 years in prison each and counts 4,5,6 to 7 years in jail
"The accused having been convicted and sentenced will be entered into the Sexual offenders record," the magistrate ruled.
In his mitigation, the accused had alleged that he was framed and pleaded for a lenient sentence.
Scheller was charged in 2020 and denied bail after the prosecution said the case against him was a serious offence and he was a flight risk.
It is alleged that between March and April at Nyalenda in Kisumu Central, he defiled a 13-year-old child.
He was also charged with two counts of showing a pornographic video to boys.
“On dates between March and April at Nyalenda in Kisumu, he unlawfully and intentionally exposed a child aged 13 years to an indecent audiovisual,” the charge sheet read
It is alleged that he recruited, transported and harbored a 13-year-old child for purposes of exploitation employing fraud.
According to Scheller, he told the court he wanted to help the child and the mother agreed, adding that anything else was a lie.
However, the state said the accused was a child molester.
Scheller was arrested after the police had trailed him for months.
He was nabbed outside the German Embassy in the company of one of the victims.