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– DP William Ruto through his lawyer had applied to have ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda forced to probe and prosecute ICC staff over misconduct in the Kenyan cases
– The ICC has, however, rejected the application on grounds that it was made late after Ruto and Sang had been acquitted by the court
– Ruto through his lawyer, Karim Khan, had accused the ICC staff of misconduct including bribing witnesses and having sex with them
– Ruto and Sang’s cases of crimes against humanity ended in April 5, 2016 due to lack of evidence
READ ALSO: William Ruto wants ICC staff charged
Deputy President William Ruto’s attempts to have the International Criminal Court (ICC) staff and witnesses probed and prosecuted over Kenyan cases have hit a snag after judges threw out the case.
The court rejected the call which sought to compel the court to have a special prosecutor investigate officers working for Chief Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda on grounds that they mishandled the cases facing Ruto and Sang before they were dropped.
While making the decision, three judges, Chile Eboe-Osuji, Olga Herrera Carbucchia and Robert Fremr, declared Ruto’s application as ‘moot’. They also believe that Ruto’s lawyer, Karim Khan, had gone personal by seeking to have ICC staff probed.
“The chamber notes the evident acrimony that permeated the parties’ submissions. As the record of the trial proceedings in the prosecutor v Ruto and Sang case shows, this chamber has consistently discouraged such attitude on the part of counsel appearing before it. The chamber thus reminds counsel that the dictates of professional responsibility require counsel to maintain detachment at all times from the case they are litigating,” the judges made the decision as quoted by Standard.
According to the court, DP Ruto would have succeeded had he made the appeal just before the April 5, 2016, ruling which saw his case end at the court. They said the proper forum for the applicants to bring their complaint would be the Pre-Trial Division.
The judges said that ‘the decision of April 5, 2016, was made final as it was not appealed by any of the parties’.
“The chamber recalls the wisdom of the maxim that litigation must come to a conclusion at some point. That point was when the period of appeal elapsed without an appeal,” they said.
DP Ruto’s legal team believes that a number of staff at the ICC and witnesses had colluded to ensure their cases drag on, and had applied to push Bensouda to order an independent investigation into misconduct of ICC staff, intermediaries and witnesses.
Among the crimes the ICC staff is accused of include bribing witnesses to testify falsely and having sex with witnesses.
The ICC’s Trial Chamber V (A) ruled on Tuesday, April 5, that William Ruto and Joshua Arap Sang cases would not proceed to full trial and had been dropped all together.
The Hague-based court claimed that the case had been terminated due to witness tampering and political meddling.
Ruto and Sang were the only one left at the ICC after four other suspects including Uhuru Kenyatta had their cases dropped on lack of sufficient evidence.
Image: Star
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