Ruling awaited in Orina trial

THE murder trial of Kenyan nurse Kenneth Orina is heading for what could be a key point early next year, when a ruling is set to be given on alleged self-incriminating statements that Orina made after his arrest almost three years ago.

In the ruling, Judge Christie Liebenberg will be deciding if statements made by Orina following his arrest can be used as evidence in his trial in the High Court at Oshakati.Orina (37), who is accused of having murdered his wife, and then dismembering and dumping her remains, at Grootfontein in mid-September 2007, has objected to these statements being admitted as evidence in his trial. He is claiming that the statements were not made freely and voluntarily, but were the result of assaults, torture and threats that Police officers subjected him to after his arrest on October 30 2007.Orina’s defence lawyer, Inonge Mainga, and State advocate Neville Wamambo addressed Judge Liebenberg at the end of a trial within a trial on the admissibility of the statements on Thursday last week. After their arguments, Judge Liebenberg reserved his ruling, and the trial was postponed to January 18 to 28 2011.The prosecution is expected to present the last of its evidence in the trial when it continues. The testimony of 40 State witnesses has been presented to the court in the main part of the trial so far.Orina has pleaded not guilty to a charge of murder, in which he is accused of having killed his wife, fellow Kenyan and nurse Rose Chepkemoi Kiplangat (33), in their flat at the Grootfontein State Hospital Nurses’ Home between September 14 and 17 2007. He is also denying guilt on a charge of defeating or obstructing the course of justice, or attempting to do so, and an alternative charge of violating a dead human body, in connection with allegations that he cut up his wife’s remains and then dumped the body parts at four scenes at Grootfontein.Wamambo argued on Thursday that all five of the disputed documents should be accepted as evidence before the court.The evidence being contested by Orina are a statement that he made before a Magistrate on November 14 2007, the record of the plea he gave in front of another magistrate in the Grootfontein Magistrate’s Court on November 20 2007, two records of his alleged pointing out of scenes to two Police officers on November 15 and 20 2007, and a document on which he is claimed to have identified a human head at the Police Mortuary in Windhoek as being part of his wife’s remains on November 22 2007.Wamambo argued that in his testimony during the trial within a trial Orina contradicted himself, especially on his claims about having been assaulted by two of the Police officers involved in the investigation of his case.Orina had opportunities to inform both magistrates about alleged assaults or threats that he claimed were made against him, but he never made such complaints to the magistrates at the time, Wamambo said.The evidence as a whole shows that Orina did not act under any threats or undue influence when he made the statements in question, Wamambo argued.Mainga argued to the contrary: that, looking at the evidence as a whole, all of the statements should be rejected as inadmissible.She argued that the evidence indicates that some irregularity occurred before and when Orina made the statements.The record of the plea Orina gave in the Grootfontein Magistrate’s Court on November 20 2007 shows that he was not warned of his rights to legal representation on that day, she said. That alone is sufficient reason to disallow the record of the plea he gave that day, she argued.On the statement he had made before another magistrate six days earlier, Mainga argued that magistrate should have made more thorough enquiries to establish if Orina was making the statement out of his own free will, or whether he had been brought to a state of mind where he was induced to make a confession.The pointing out of scenes by Orina are also suspect, she indicated, with the second pointing out for instance claimed to have occurred when the Police realised that Orina did not point out the knives allegedly used in the murder and its aftermath when he first pointed out scenes to a Police officer, Mainga said. It is highly improbable that he would have told the Police, after he had pointed out scenes for a first time, that he wanted to be taken to the scene again because he also wanted to point out the knives to them, she argued.Orina has remained in custody since his arrest. That situation remains unchanged with the postponement of his trial to January 18.