Man found with Ksh.960M fake currency jailed for 8 years

A Chad national was on Wednesday sentenced to eight years in prison on three counts, among them being in possession of fake cash totalling over Ksh.960 million in foreign currency.

Abdoulaye Tamba Kouro was found guilty of being in possession of papers intended to resemble and pass as currency notes, forgery, as well as obtaining money by false pretence.

Nairobi's Milimani court heard that the accused was on October 1, 2018 found with 54,000 pieces of forged US dollars in denominations of 100 at Sandalwood apartment in Kilimani.

On the same day, he was also nabbed with 19,000 pieces of Euros in denominations of 100, and another 3,400 pieces of the same currency in denominations of 500; all totalling at Ksh.960,120,000.

A year earlier - on March 9, 2017 - he is reported to have defrauded a man identified as Makau Muteke a sum of USD 6,796 by falsely pretending that he was in a position to invest the funds for him in a business.

“The prosecution, through Virginia Kariuki informed the court that, according to the pre-sentence report filed on 21st November 2023 by Probation and Aftercare Service, the convict was not remorseful of the offence and that he is a flight risk, warranting a custodial sentence,” the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (ODPP) said in a statement.

“Senior Principal Magistrate Benmark Ekhubi agreed with the prosecution who called a total of 7 witnesses and produced 15 exhibits...”

The accused was hence imprisoned for four years without an option of a fine for being in possession of fake currency notes; two years without an option of a fine for forger; as well as a fine of Ksh.400,000 or another two-year jail sentence for obtaining money by false pretence.

Magistrate Ekhubi ruled that the sentences will run concurrently.

Abdoulaye was in 2018 also charged with obtaining Ksh.76 million from Tana River Senator Danson Mungatana fraudulently.

Mungatana previously told the court that he sold all his investments in the get- rich-quick scheme that never materialized and instead led him to poverty.

During a hearing at a Nairobi court in October last year, Mungatana explained to the court that his late wife died not knowing the truth about their Karen home, which was part of his lost assets.