The late businessman Nginyo Kariuki. FILE PHOTO | NMG The widow and children of the late businessman Lawrence Nginyo Kariuki risk fines and jail terms after the High Court declared that they had appropriated part of his assets before receiving permission to manage the estate.
The court has also ordered a forensic audit of the Sh4 billion estate after Margaret Wangari Nginyo and some of her six children, including Jane Alice Wambui Kiragu and Silas Macharia Kariuki, withdrew more than Sh70 million from the deceased’s bank accounts at I&M Bank and Consolidated Bank of Kenya.
Mr Kariuki died on February 24,2020, leaving a vast estate, including real estate, farming, bank deposits and government bonds and a will that is being contested in court by three children he bore out of wedlock — Brenda Nyambura, Alex Ndoria and Austine Wachira.
Before 4 obtaining approval to run the estate, Margaret and her children started withdrawing money from the deceased’s bank accounts.
In one instance on March 10, 2020, they applied for and transferred Sh1.1 million from the deceased’s bank account at Consolidated Bank of Kenya.
They have stated that the cash has been used to pay legitimate expenses, including settling debts of the estate and funding his funeral.
But in a judgment delivered Tuesday, Justice Stella Mutuku said the transactions were illegal because the will has been contested, exposing the three to potential legal action.
“Without authority to support their actions, I am constrained to make a finding that the acts by the executors or respondents in dealing with the estate as they did, amounts to intermeddling in the estate of the deceased,” the judge said.
“There was nothing standing in the way of the respondents to move to court to seek the authority they required to deal with the estate of the deceased as they waited for the contested issues to be resolved.”
A person who is found guilty of illegally appropriating the property of the deceased faces a fine not exceeding Sh10,000 or a term of imprisonment not exceeding one year or both.
Justice Mutuku ordered the three to account for the money they had withdrawn from bank accounts of the estate or return the cash. The judge also ordered a forensic audit of all the assets Mr Kariuki left behind.“That failure to account as ordered… the respondents shall refund to the estate all and any of the proceeds they have withdrawn from the deceased’s accounts and or misappropriated […]