{"id":26624,"date":"2016-07-05T02:37:25","date_gmt":"2016-07-05T02:37:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/kenyan-police-in-court-over-lawyer-willie-kimani\/"},"modified":"2016-07-05T02:38:17","modified_gmt":"2016-07-05T02:38:17","slug":"kenyan-police-in-court-over-lawyer-willie-kimani","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/kenyan-police-in-court-over-lawyer-willie-kimani\/","title":{"rendered":"Kenyan police in court over lawyer Willie Kimani’s death"},"content":{"rendered":"

{Three Kenyan police officers have appeared in court over the murder of a human rights lawyer, whose body was found on Friday after he went missing.}<\/p>\n

Willie Kimani disappeared after lodging a complaint against a police officer on behalf of a client, who was also killed, along with their driver.<\/p>\n

The Law Society of Kenya has called on all lawyers to boycott courts this week, while nationwide protests have been organised.<\/p>\n

The three officers have not commented.<\/p>\n

A judge ordered that they be held in custody for two weeks while investigations are carried out. They were not charged as we initially reported.<\/p>\n

All court cases that were due to be heard this week will now be adjourned until lawyers return to work after the boycott, reports the BBC’s Ferdinand Omondi in Nairobi.<\/p>\n

The killings have sparked outrage in Kenya and many have blamed the police force for a series of extrajudicial killings in recent years.<\/p>\n

The hashtag #StopExtrajudicialKillings gained popularity on social media as people gathered to take part in protests around the country.<\/p>\n

A joint statement by 34 Kenyan and international human rights organisations condemned the killings, reports the AFP news agency.<\/p>\n

“These extrajudicial killings are a chilling reminder that the hard-won right to seek justice for human rights violations is under renewed attack,” said Muthoni Wanyeki from Amnesty International.<\/p>\n

Government spokesman Eric Kiraithe told the BBC’s Newsday programme there were no “death squads” within the police force and that allegations of officers committing crimes would be fully investigated.<\/p>\n

Kenyan security forces carried out 25 extrajudicial killing between 2013 and 2015, Kenya’s official rights body said.<\/p>\n

However, non-governmental watchdog Independent Medico-Legal Unit (IMLU) says the police killed 97 people in 2015 alone.<\/p>\n

{{High-profile extrajudicial killings in Kenya:}}<\/p>\n

In May 2016 Businessman Jacob Juma was shot dead while driving home. He had been involved in several high-profile legal cases against the government over failed business deals<\/p>\n

In October 2013 Muslim cleric Ibrahim “Rogo” Omar was shot dead while driving home. Mr Rogo was alleged to have links with Islamist militants al-Shabab
\nIn August 2012 Muslim cleric Aboud Rogo Mohammed was killed in a drive-by shooting. He was from the same mosque as Mr Omar and was also accused of backing al-Shabab<\/p>\n

In March 2009 human rights activist Oscar Kamau Kingara, who investigated extrajudicial killings, was shot dead in his car shot as he drove home.<\/p>\n

\"Protestors<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

{Three Kenyan police officers have appeared in court over the murder of a human rights lawyer, whose body was found on Friday after he went missing.} Willie Kimani disappeared after lodging a complaint against a police officer on behalf of a client, who was also killed, along with their driver. The Law Society of Kenya […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[100],"byline":[249],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-26624","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-africa","byline-bbc"],"bylines":[{"id":249,"name":"BBC","slug":"bbc","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":104}],"contributors":[{"id":249,"name":"BBC","slug":"bbc","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":104}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26624","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26624"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26624\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26624"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26624"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26624"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=26624"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=26624"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}