Police officer arrested during raid on drugs, sex dens in Nairobi

A police officer was on Friday night arrested during a multi-agency operation targeting a shisha lounge along Ngong Road, Nairobi suspected of being involved in drugs and sex trafficking.

The team comprising the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI), the National Agency for the Campaign Against Alcohol and Drug Abuse (Nacada) and the Anti-Narcotics Unit (ANU), was responding to allegations of laced shisha drug at the den.

According to the police, the establishment had been under surveillance for sex and drug trafficking which included minors.

“Intelligence indicated that the underage girls involved in the trafficking were from a neighbouring country and had been brought in from refugee camps,” the police report read in part.

The team arrested the officer, a police constable, at the premises on Muchai Road, which is owned by the officer and his wife, who was not present at the time of the raid.

The officer was armed with an unlicensed CZ Pistol loaded with 15 rounds of ammunition.

The raid also resulted in the seizure of 20 rounds of 7.62 by 39mm ammunition, a CZ pistol loaded with 15 rounds of ammunition, marijuana and shisha bongs suspected of being laced with drugs.

Following his arrest, the officer was remanded in custody at Muthaiga Police Station pending arraignment at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) Law Courts.

According to the police, cases of drug trafficking and consumption are rampant in such joints.

The authorities have vowed to continue investigating the illegal activities associated with the lounge.

Nacada had intensified shisha joints raids in the country and has arrested dozens of people and closed some.

"This thing (shisha) has permeated our society so much. It is affecting our children. It is affecting the masses in the country and productivity,” said Nacada CEO Anthony Omerikwa.

Omerikwa admitted that despite the fact that the substance is illegal, it is still widely used in the country.

"The sale is banned, the use is banned, but here we have over 100 shisha bongs ... in a residential area and it is actually causing pollution."

In 2017, Kenya implemented a comprehensive ban on shisha, including advertising, promotion, distribution, and encouraging or facilitating its use.

"Any person who contravenes any provision of these regulations may, where a penalty is not expressly provided for in any provision of the Act, be liable to the penalty provided for in section 163 of the Act," the government said when announcing the ban on December 27, 2017.