KENYAN nurse Kenneth Bunge Orina, who is accused of killing his wife, cutting up her remains and dumping her body parts around Grootfontein three years ago, pleaded not guilty to two charges at the start of his trial in the High Court at Oshakati yesterday.
Orina (37) is charged with counts of murder, read with the provisions of the Combating of Domestic Violence Act, and defeating or obstructing the course of justice, or attempting to do so. He is also facing an alternative charge of violating a dead human body.’Not guilty,’ Orina told Judge Christie Liebenberg three times when he was asked what his plea was on each of the two main counts and the alternative charge.’There is no plea explanation. The State is put to the proof of its case,’ defence lawyer Inonge Mainga told the court after Orina had given his plea.The crimes that Orina is accused of baffled the Police from September 17 2007, when the first human body parts were discovered next to a street at Grootfontein, until Orina’s arrest on October 30 that year.A human head and forearms were the first body parts to be found at the town.Five days later, human upper arms and the lower parts of legs were found on the outskirts of Grootfontein. The body parts puzzle was completed another three days later, when two human thighs and a torso were also found on the southwestern outskirts of the town.The remains are alleged to be those of Orina’s wife, Rose Chepkemoi Kiplangat (33). This crucial allegation is however being disputed by Orina, it emerged from Mainga’s cross-examination of one of the prosecution witnesses yesterday.Orina is accused of killing Kiplangat in their flat at the Nurses’ Home of Grootfontein State Hospital between September 14 and 17 2007.The prosecution is claiming that Kiplangat died after she had been stabbed in the chest or her throat had been cut with a knife or other sharp object.In an attempt to hide the killing and frustrate the Police’s investigation of the matter, Orina is alleged to have cleaned the scene where Kiplangat died and to have dismembered her remains and discarded the body parts at various places around Grootfontein.He allegedly also inserted panties into his dead wife’s private parts and stuffed a face cloth into her chest cavity before dumping her torso.Orina went on leave from his job at the hospital from September 24 to October 5 2007, Grootfontein State Hospital Matron Saara Haufiku told the court yesterday. She said he told her his mother was ill and he had to travel to Kenya urgently to visit her.A number of Kenyan nationals who know Orina testified yesterday.One of them, Dominic Muema, told the judge that when he asked Orina on October 11 2007 about the whereabouts of his wife, Orina told him she had gone to visit friends somewhere.Another witness, Margaret Aballa, testified that Orina told her on October 3 that his wife had gone somewhere to look for a job.A fellow nurse, Phyllis Njeru, who knew Orina and Kiplangat both, said she recognised a photo of the severed human head that had been found at Grootfontein when it was published in a local newspaper. She said she recognised the face on the photo as being Kiplangat – but this was only after she had started hearing rumours that he had killed his wife.Another nurse, Catherine Bonaya, who also knew the couple, said she identified the head at the Police Mortuary in Windhoek as being part of Kiplangat’s remains on November 23 2007.She identified the head on the basis of the shape of the face, its short hair, and its dental features, she said. Rose Kiplangat had short hair and a slender face and had prominent front teeth, Bonaya said.Mainga however told Bonaya her instructions from Orina are that the body she identified at the mortuary was not the remains of his wife.Bonaya also testified that when Orina told her on September 22 2007 that he had to travel to Kenya because his mother was sick, he told her that his wife would not accompany him and that she had travelled to Windhoek to visit a friend.The trial continues today. State advocate Neville Wamambo is prosecuting.
