By Kylie M Tsudama
Impunity Watch Reporter, Africa

NAIROBI, Kenya – Thomas Cholmondeley was released from prison on Thursday after serving more than two years.

“He has already left Kamiti [maximum prison].  I understand he is already at the farm,” said Cholmondeley’s lawyer, Fred Ojiambo.

Cholmondeley, the great-grandson of the third Baron Delamere, one of Kenya’s first white settlers, shot and killed Robert Njoya on his family’s estate in Rift Valley ranch.  This shooting was the second time in just over a year that he shot a black man.

He had previously faced murder charges after he killed a Maasai game park ranger in 2005.  Cholmondeley was acquitted, however, for lack of evidence. This time around he denied killing Njoya, saying that he and his friend only shot and killed dogs when they fired at the poachers trespassing on the property.

Cholmondeley’s charge was reduced from murder to manslaughter.  When High Court judge Muga Apondi read the sentence on May 14 he said that the killing was not premeditated and that Cholmondeley showed concern for the victim.  Also, he had already spent 1,097 days in custody.  The prosecution appealed the verdict, saying it was “gross miscarriage of justice” but so far there has been no ruling.

Earlier this year Cholmondeley was sentenced to eight months in prison for shooting Njoya, who he believed to be poaching on his property.

Racial tensions stirred after Njoya’s killing, re-opening wounds of Kenya’s colonial history.  Cholmondeley’s trial was one of the most high-profile in Kenya’s post-independence history.

“It’s now clear that we have two sets of law in Kenya.  My family continues to suffer after the brutal killing of my husband and the bread winner,” said Lucy Sisina, the widow of the ranger Cholmondeley killed in 2005.

Naivasha residents and relatives originally thought Cholmondeley’s May release date was too early and are upset at his even earlier release.  The release has caused some from the local black Kenyan community to believe that a colonial-era two-speed judiciary is still in place in the country.

Commissioner of Prisons Isaiah Osugo said that they often release prisoners a few months early if their release date is coming up.

“I can’t believe that he is free,” said Njoya’s wife, Sarah.  “There is nothing I can do.  This is beyond me.”

For more information, please see:

CNN – Kenyan Aristocrat Freed From Prison – 24 October 2009

AFP – Kenyan British Aristocrat Freed – 23 October 2009

AP – White Kenyan Aristocrat Released from Prison – 23 October 2009

BBC – Convicted Kenya Aristocrat Freed – 23 October 2009

NY Times – Kenya: Aristocrat Out of Prison – 23 October 2009