The mysterious death of Meru Senator Mithika Linturi’s housemaid took a new twist yesterday after the Director of Criminal Investigations (DCI) George Kinoti sought High court orders to exhume the body for postmortem.

 In an affidavit filed in court, the DCI through Chief Inspector Maurice Amwai sought an order of exhumation of Linturi’s late housegirl Edith Kananu saying his office has opened a fresh inquest file and investigations are ongoing to ascertain the circumstances under which she died.

 The DCI claims the legislator is a person of interest in the death of the late Kananu who died in Linturi’s house in October 6, 2018.

 “We pray that this court in the public interest and to assist the investigative agencies to further investigate the murder, calls for an exhumation of the deceased pursuant to section 387(2) of the criminal procedure code cap 75 Laws of Kenya,” Amwai states.

 While seeking the orders, the DCI says that nobody will suffer prejudice if an order for exhumation and post-mortem is granted to establish the cause of death of the late Kananu who was allegedly murdered through poisoning. Kananu was laid to rest without a post-mortem being conducted.

 The officer claims that there are blackmail, intimidation and all other manner of dirty tricks to ensure that the cause of death is concealed and never established.

 “That there are concerted efforts of all manner including blackmail, intimidation, bribery, and all other manner of dirty tricks to ensure that the cause of death is concealed and never to be established,” Amwai says

 Amwai further dismissed Linturi’s averments that he knows Kananu’s cause of death saying he is not a medical doctor or pathologist.

“Linturi’s averments to the cause of the death of Edith Kananu are suspicious and expose him as a person of interest,” he says.

The DCI accuses Linturi of refusing to cooperate with investigators by failing and refusing to record a statement and up to now they don’t know if his response is incriminative or exonerative.

Further, the officer claims that the legislator has black-mailed and intimidated Kananu’s next of kin and persuaded them to buy her without a post-mortem which could have helped establish the cause of her sudden death.

The DCI says Linturi is a habitual offender who has an inherent instinct of crime and humbly urged the court to protect and save all the victims, widows, orphans and those in fear because he bribes his way through the criminal justice system.

“Linturi is a person of interest for an ongoing criminal investigation as alleged in the petition and as such he is out to discredit the DCI as he seeks public sympathy to escape justice,” he said.

The new turn of events comes after activist Michael Makarena petitioned the High court to compel the DCI to carry out investigations into the death of the senator’s house help, business partner and his alleged fake degree.

 On his part, Linturi has filed an affidavit in the matter claiming that Makarena was a mercenary and hireling of Meru Governor Kiraitu Murungi and Kinoti.

However, Amwai dismissed the allegations terming them as an attack on the DCI’s persons since they are not backed by any evidence and they do not meet the evidential threshold as required by law.

The officer also says that his boss Kinoti cannot use or hire anyone as a mercenary as alleged in the file cases in court as had been alleged by Linturi.