The 12-hour raid on Ali Punjanis house that recovered two rolls of bhang

A battalion of security officers on Tuesday descended on wanted tycoon Ali Punjani’s Nyali home in Mombasa County, with sniffer dogs in tow, ready for action. The raid was all planned out.

But the sting operation was dead on arrival after the officers were met with a fortified fortress.

It took the officers nearly 20 hours from Monday 3pm to Tuesday at 11am to gain access into the home.

Did the officers squander the element of surprise in the operation to maximize on gathering of evidence?

If the raid was meant to get Punjani with the smoking gun, it fell well short of it. In business terms, the return on investment was paltry, and that is, if at all it could be considered a return.

According to Mombasa police Commander Johnstone Ipara, detectives recovered only two rolls of bhang and Ksh.3, 000.

Security experts claiming the supposed raid was a mockery of the intended outcome.

“This was not intelligence‘s best because if they were raiding for drugs, where were the drugs? This was a knee jerk reaction and PR because the CS was there and had said that they wanted to fight drug cartels. The police wanted to be seen to be doing something,” said George Musamali – Security Analyst.

The detectives’ action of storming into the house and their way of collecting evidence also raised questions.

To cast a dark shadow in the operation, police raided Punjani’s house without a search warrant.

The court has since slammed the door on the police raid after freeing five suspects among them Punjani’s wife, arrested during the raid.

They were freed after the police failed to press charges within 24 hours as directed by the court

Police had sought to detain the suspects for seven days pending further probe.