The defence lawyers had earlier protested against proceeding with the pre-trial conference for purposes of fixing hearing dates since the prosecution was yet to serve the accused persons with relevant documents to be relied upon by the State to prove its case/FILE
NAIROBI, Kenya, Jun 20 – The pre-trial conference of accused persons in the Sh468 million National Youth Service (NYS) case will take place at the Milimani Law Courts in Nairobi on Wednesday.
The conference came a day after the accused persons were freed on stringent bond terms by the High Court.
The defence lawyers had earlier protested against proceeding with the pre-trial conference for purposes of fixing hearing dates since the prosecution was yet to serve the accused persons with relevant documents to be relied upon by the State to prove its case.
The defence argued that to do so it will be prejudicial to their clients’ rights to a fair trial.
Nairobi Magistrate Douglas Ogoti ordered the suspects to collect the documents sought from the Directorate of Criminal Investigations next Wednesday.
All the 46 suspects have been ordered to execute a Sh5 million bond with a Sh2 million surety and Sh1 million cash bail.
Justice Hedwig Ong’undi, who ordered their release, ruled that there was no convincing reason from the State that the accused persons are likely to interfere with witnesses.
The accused persons had been in remand for close to three weeks now from when they denied charges of taking part in the theft.
Those freed include Principal Secretary in the Ministry of Public Service Lillian Omollo and NYS Director General Richard Ndubai, who stepped aside prior to their arrest and subsequent prosecution.
Justice Ong’undi ruled that there is no evidence to suggest that the accused persons’ release will be a threat to national security.
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