A Magistrates' court has warned the police against torturing a man under investigation for allegedly posting a photo of the president in a casket on his X account, along with a condolence message.
Milimani Magistrate Susan Shitubi acknowledged that the matter involves powerful people and there's fear that '"maybe he will be tortured".
"Let him not be tortured. If you need to charge him, charge him but please he shouldn't be tortured," she reiterated.
Shitubi said the court must be careful to protect the rights of the suspect but at the same time, it should not appear to be trivialising any crime that has been committed.
Shitubi made the remarks following an application by the DCI (Serious Crimes Unit) to have Benson Malova detained for 14 days pending further probe.
Malova was arrested on January 21, in Bungoma township, and later escorted to Nairobi and placed in custody at Muthaiga Police Station.
The court heard that the detectives are probing a case of publication of false information contrary to section 23 of the Computer Misuse and Cybercrime Act.
The investigations were instituted following a publication done on X under username Ash papi TM.
The user allegedly shared a suspected edited picture depicting a funeral of President William Ruto.
The photo was captioned as "my condolences to the first family" which investigators say is deemed to imply that death had befallen the first family.
The post according to DCI has attracted over 1.4 million views.
They said they need 14 days because when the suspect was arrested, he was searched and allegedly found to be in possession of a phone that needs to be subjected to forensic examination.
Based on this, the DCI told the court the suspect's true identity remains in doubt and if released he is likely to abscond.
But the Magistrate declined to grant them 14 days and instead gave them four days.
She said if the police will not have completed their probe by Friday, the suspect will be automatically released.
