Sarah Wairimu Cohen with her counsel, Pravin Bowry, at the Kibera court during a hearing /LEAH MUKANGAI
Tob Cohen feared for his life and named his wife Sarah Wairimu as the person behind any harm that might befall him, a court heard today.
Giving sworn testimony before Justice Diana Kavedza at the Kibera Law Courts, Tob's close friend and former Gatundu MP Patrick Kariuki Muiruri recounted the businessman's final hours and a domestic feud that had become a matter of police complaint.
But it was a phone call on the night of July 19, 2019 that Muiruri said laid bare the magnitude of Tob's fears. He told the court that Cohen called him terribly disturbed, saying the problems between him and Sarah had escalated and that he now feared for his life.
Tob told Muiruri that police had gone to arrest Sarah for assault and grievous harm, but she locked herself in the house. The officers left. Other police from the Spring Valley police station came, but instead of arresting her, they talked to her and left.
Tob said he was going home but was afraid of what would happen there and that the officers he had seen at his home were scary.
He feared for his life because the police had failed to arrest her.
"PK, PK, if anything bad happens to me, if I'm found dead somewhere, tell them it's Sarah behind it," Muiruri quoted Tob as saying.
Muiruri told him he hoped that would not happen. It was the last conversation they had, lasting about fifteen to twenty minutes. When Ngengi Muigai later called to ask why Muiruri had not told him Tob was missing, Muiruri said he felt scared because he knew Tob was not missing.
He went to DCI headquarters, which was not far from his house, to report a murder, not a missing person, "because I knew. "Muiruri, who golfed with Tob and enjoyed a friendship with Tob for nearly three decades, told the court that the deceased had confided in his golfing friends that he was having marital trouble and intended to divorce Sarah.
"Tob told me that one of the reasons was that for the last four years, they had not been in bed together," Muiruri testified.
"The other thing he told me was that she had stolen his title documents." The witness said Tob had also engaged a lawyer, Danstan Omari, to handle an assault matter, while a separate advocate was to handle the divorce.
The court heard that Sarah had allegedly stolen money specifically from their company, Kenya Gold Safaris Travel Limited, and was using those misappropriated funds to construct a hotel in Nanyuki.
Muiruri testified that Tob showed him and others a video on his phone documenting the hotel project alongside a gruesome clip of his face covered in blood, his glasses broken, crying out for Sarah after an alleged assault.
The deceased had also complained that police had failed to arrest his wife despite his reports. The feud extended into the couple's social life. Muiruri described a tense wedding at Tob's Farasi Lane residence for Sarah's adopted daughter.
"Tob was not very pleased with the way the ceremony was going," Muiruri said.
The MC sidelined Tob and did not introduce him. When Tob took the microphone to welcome guests to his home, Sarah grabbed it and said, "This is not your home. You're talking nonsense." Tob retreated to Muiruri, rejected and humiliated in his own house. Muiruri also described the aftermath of the discovery of Tob's body.
On September 30, 2019, journalist John Kamau called him at around 3:30 PM to inform him that Cohen's body had been found at his residence. Muiruri immediately shared the devastating news with everyone assembled at the Tribe Hotel, including Tob's sister Hannah Gabrielle Stratton, her husband Roy Stratton, and more than ten international journalists from the Netherlands.
Everyone broke down in tears. Muiruri then drove Gabrielle directly to Cohen's residence. The body had been found in a septic tank. The hearing was part of the ongoing murder trial of Sarah Wairimu, who is accused of killing her husband in July 2019.
The prosecution sought to rely on Muiruri's testimony as evidence of Tob's state of mind and his fear of his wife. The defence has consistently denied the charge, arguing that the evidence is circumstantial and that the investigation was flawed.
Justice Kavedza admitted the testimony, ruling that it was relevant to the issues before the court. The trial continues on October 14, with five more prosecution witnesses expected to testify.
