Mirema Murder: DCI exposes how Samuel Mugota operated ATM and bank fraud syndicate

The Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) has shed more light on the life of the late Samuel Mugo Mugota who was gunned down in broad daylight near Mirema Springs Apartments in Roysambu.

According to the videos and photos shared by the DCI, Mugota was captured preying on suspecting victims at ATM booths on different dates in between 2011 and 2019.

“The findings have revealed skeletons in the man’s dark life dating as far back as 2011, when Muvota started stealing from victims at ATM’s in various banks and graduated to a full-time thug who hired beautiful expensive-looking women and deployed them as drinks spiking agents at various high end entertainment spots,” the statement from DCI read in part.

Other than being linked to a syndicate that drugs revelers in clubs within the city, Mugota was also being probed over ATM theft and fraud.

He was believed to be engaged in ATM card swapping and illegally accessing client accounts.

“Muvota began his trade in 2011 by hanging around city ATM’s and offering to assist customers who had difficulties withdrawing money from their accounts. Working with crooked banking officials who would jam the teller machines once a client inserted his ATM card, Muvota would approach the client offering to assist.

“He would insert the client’s card then pretend to be facing away and ask the client to key in his password and first confirm the balance before withdrawing the amount they wished. However, since the machines eject the ATM card first, he would get hold of the card as the unsuspecting client waited for the cash. At this point, Muvota would swap the card with another and hand the happy client a fake card,” the DCI shared.

In 2018, at an ATM in Kayole, he transferred Sh700,000 in a single transaction from a woman’s account to one of his fraudulent accounts. When she learned of what had happened, she collapsed and died.

The woman had walked to the ATM booth to check whether a loan she had applied for at the bank had been deposited in her account when she met Mugota.

He used proceeds from his criminal past to acquire several properties and cars in Nairobi and married seven wives who lived a lavish lifestyle.

According to DCI, economic crimes detectives who have previously handled his cases, Mugota was arrested over 30 times in the past 11 years on fraud-related charges.