Advocates of Equity Bank employee Machiri Kimani, blamed for losing Kes 1.5 billion, petitioned a Nairobi court to order his release by 2 p.m. on Thursday.

Led by Ndegwa Njiru, the lawyers mounted an urgent habeas corpus request before Magistrate Geoffrey Onsarigo, protesting what they termed an illegal arrest after their client’s apparent release on bond.

Njiru told the court that the police breached bond terms by arresting their client, who is at the center of a banking fraud that saw Kes 1.5 billion transferred in suspicious transactions.

The police reportedly freed Kimani on a Kes 500,000 bond and required him to report to DCI headquarters on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Lawyers told the court the police were holding Kimani incommunicado and that his family was traumatised fearing for his life.

Additionally, they submitted that the respondent’s wife, one Susan Wariga, made a report of a missing person at Kikuyu Police Ptation vide an OB 0512/8/24.

The lawyers told the court the police also arested Kimani’s father and fired live rounds to intimidate him.