Undercover detectives arrested two people on Wednesday, August 16, and recovered a sniper rifle in Nairobi.
Police from Kware Station said they spotted a motorcycle with its number plates concealed, and when they stopped it, the pillion managed to jump and escape.
During the interrogation of the rider, who was identified as Ronald Juma Anyanyi, he identified himself as an ex-Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) solder.
Also read: DCI rule out sniper theory in fatal shooting of NHIF employee
Upon searching him, the detectives recovered a Mossberg Patriot short gun with a telescopic sight loaded with 7.62mm live ammo concealed in a nylon bag.
The Mossberg Patriot short gun is mostly known for its line of hunting, sport shooting, service and defense-oriented pump-action.
The suspect later took the detectives to his house located in the Utawala area, where they also recovered another six (6) rounds of 7.62mm, twenty-six (26) rounds of 9mm a Heckler & Koch HK21bipod stand, a pair of handcuffs, military fatigue used by KDF and a military service register identification showing he was dismissed from the service on 22 September 2022.
Also found in the house was a 20-year-old woman identified as Stephanie Mwende who the police believe is the girlfriend of the third suspect who managed to escape during the arrest.
Police have since launched a manhunt for the third suspect, Boniface Aburiri Wakhusama.
According to the police, the trio is believed to be behind a series of serious crimes committed within Embakasi and Kayole.
Also read: Mother, daughter arrested with sniper rifle, machine gun in Dagoretti
In 2021, detectives from the Anti-Terror Police Unit (ATPU) arrested two women and recovered a cache of firearms in a city house.
The two suspects, mother and daughter, were arrested by the Directorate of Criminal Investigation (DCI) officers at Racecourse in Dagoretti Corner, Nairobi, where they live.
According to DCI, the weapons are suspected to have been sneaked into the country for terror activities by the two who hold dual citizenship.
The recovered cache of arms and ammunition included an M4 sniper rifle, four pistols, a close-quarter Uzi automatic submachine gun, and over 3,700 rounds of ammunition of different calibers.
“Also recovered in the operation were four pistols and a close quarter Uzi automatic submachine gun, capable of firing over 600 rounds per minute,” DCI said.
An M4 sniper rifle is used by the NATO forces battling the Taliban in Afghanistan, and the American-origin rifle has a 14.5 in (370 mm) barrel and a telescoping stock. It is essentially a lighter and shorter variant of the M16A2 assault rifle.
The Uzi submachine gun, a compact automatic weapon, is used worldwide as a police and special-forces firearm and is named after its designer Uziel Gal, an Israeli army officer who developed it after the Arab-Israeli war of 1948.
The weapon was phased out by the Israeli army in 2003.
