Triton oil scandal suspect Devani remanded

Businessman Yagnesh Devani will spend the next 13 days at the Industrial Area remand pending a court ruling on whether he will be released on bond in a case where he is charged with fraud.

In the meantime, Milimani Magistrate Thomas Nzyuki directed that a pre-bail report be filed in court within the next seven days.

The report, he said, should detail persons related to Devani, their whereabouts and the social behaviour of the accused person.

“The pre-bail report should be done with an element of a social enquiry. Find out persons related to him. Also, you need to find out about his behaviour, where the wife and the son are,” said the magistrate.

While this information was being sought and tabled in court, Nzyuki decided to proceed with Devani’s plea-taking and defer those related to the company.

Devani faced 11 counts of fraud, including conspiracy to defraud, obtaining by false pretenses and fraudulent disposition of mortgaged goods.

On count one, he was charged with fraudulent disposition of mortgaged goods.

It’s alleged that Devani, on September 5, 2008, as managing director of Triton Petroleum Company, and others as the mortgagor of 19,186.130 cubics metres of diesel, with the intent to defraud the mortgagee, Emirates National Oil Company of Singapore Limited, disposed of a volume of 13,054,850 cubic metres valued at $10,146,888.36 and Sh32,017,783.66 (totalling Sh1.6 billionn) to Total Kenya without the consent of Emirates National Oil.

Pump prices

He faced another count of conspiring to defraud Kenya Shell Ltd of $2.2 million and Sh7,059,201.59 by purporting that Triton had 4,449.42 cubic metres of diesel held by Kenya Pipeline Company at the Kipevu oil storage facility available for sale.

Devani denied fraud charges in relation to the scandal.

His release on bail had been strongly opposed by prosecutors in a morning court. They said they feared he might abscond.

“For someone who absconded court for 16 years to a point extradition proceedings [became necessary] to compel him to come back to attend to his matters is a compelling reason to deny him bail,” prosecutors said.

Devani’s lawyers, led by Moses Kurgat and Mwenda Mbaka, pledged to fully cooperate with probation officers and have the report filed in court promptly.

They had initially opposed yesterday’s plea-taking. Kurgat told Magistrate Nzyuki that it wouldn’t be appropriate to charge Triton as the company had been liquidated.

Devani was allegedly the managing director of Triton at the time the case started.

“The official liquidator should be in court to appear for Triton,” said Kurgat.

But state counsel Jeremiah Walusala urged the court to proceed with the plea-taking, saying prosecutors were not aware the company had been liquidated.

“There is no document or any pleadings shown to support his submission,” he said.

This prompted the court to ask for information regarding ownership of Triton as of December 2007.

The magistrate also asked parties to answer questions on who should be held responsible on behalf of Triton.

“Should it be the official receiver or the directors and who are these directors?” he posed.