A High Court sitting in Nairobi has delivered a scathing rebuke of Kenyan police investigative practices, ruling that officers who raided the home of tech entrepreneur Ndiangui Kinyagia acted unconstitutionally, and ordering the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) and Inspector General Douglas Kanja to jointly pay him Sh5 million in damages.
At the heart of Justice Patricia Mande’s judgment is a pointed criticism of how the investigation unfolded: officers searched and seized property from Kinyagia’s Kinoo home in Kiambu County without a warrant, then attempted to retroactively justify their actions.
“The police did not first obtain lawful authority and then investigate. They invaded, searched, and seized, and only thereafter sought to clothe their conduct with the appearance of legality,” the judge ruled, a finding the court described as going to the very foundation of the case, not merely a procedural misstep.
Genesis
The saga began on June 21, 2025, when officers arrived at Kinyagia’s residence as part of a wider investigation and when they found him absent, they searched the property and confiscated several items regardless.
Word that police had come looking for him reached Kinyagia before they did, and he went underground, fearing for his safety.
What followed was a tense standoff between a frightened family and an opaque investigation: his mother, unable to locate him, turned to the Law Society of Kenya, which launched habeas corpus proceedings to establish his whereabouts.
Kinyagia eventually resurfaced and told the court plainly why he’d vanished, he was afraid.
That explanation became central to the case that followed.
Rights violation
Once the habeas corpus matter concluded, Kinyagia turned his attention to a constitutional petition, arguing that the raid, the seizure of his belongings, and the manner of the investigation itself had violated his rights.
Justice Mande found breaches of Kinyagia’s right to privacy (Article 31) and right to property (Article 40), and ruled that both the DCI and the Inspector General had also violated his rights to dignity, personal security and freedom of movement.
Crucially, the judge rejected any notion that Kinyagia’s decision to flee his home was an overreaction. She characterized it instead as a “constructive and unlawful restriction of his freedom of movement”, a direct consequence of the fear state agents had instilled in him, backed by psychological evaluation evidence documenting the distress he suffered.
Perhaps the most striking passage of the ruling came as Justice Mande addressed the broader principle at stake, that constitutional protections aren’t conditional on courage or status.
“The Constitution does not reserve its protection for the bold, the powerful, or the unafraid. It extends its full shelter to the vulnerable, the frightened, and all persons whose dignity is imperiled by the coercive force of public power,” she said.
Sh5 million damages
Beyond the compensation award, the ruling carries a significant practical consequence: the Director of Public Prosecutions has been barred, via a formal order of prohibition, from pursuing any criminal case against Kinyagia stemming from the tainted investigation.
In justifying the damages, Justice Mande pointed to the cumulative weight of the violations, the unlawful home invasion, the seizure of property, and the state’s broader disregard for constitutional safeguards.
“General damages are awarded in the sum of Sh5 million, payable jointly by the first and second respondents (DCI and IG),” she ruled.
