The state’s attempt to criminalize digital dissent has collapsed in a Nairobi courtroom. David Ooga Mokaya, the Moi University student accused of circulating a digitally manipulated image of President William Ruto’s funeral procession, has been acquitted of all charges, exposing glaring gaps in the prosecution’s cybercrime protocols.

Magistrate Caroline Nyaguthi’s ruling was a scathing indictment of the police investigation. By freeing the 24-year-old accounting student, the court reinforced a critical legal standard: digital accusation is not digital proof. The prosecution’s failure to forensically link Mokaya’s devices to the viral post "Landlord @bozgabi" turned what was billed as a landmark cybercrime trial into a humiliating defeat for the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI).

Anatomy of a Failed Prosecution

The case hinged on a tweet from November 2024, which featured a casket draped in the Kenyan flag with the caption "President William Ruto's body leaves Lee Funeral Home." The state argued this was a calculated act of cyber-subversion intended to cause panic. However, under cross-examination, the investigating officers could not provide the digital "smoking gun"—an IP address or device log definitively tying Mokaya to the X (formerly Twitter) handle in question.

"I am a patriot," Mokaya had declared from the dock, a defense that resonated as the state’s case crumbled. The court found that the police had relied on circumstantial assumptions rather than hard forensic data. The seizure of Mokaya’s phone and laptop yielded no evidence of the original image or the login credentials for the offending account, leaving the magistrate with no option but to dismiss the charges.

• Digital Rights Victory: This acquittal sets a significant precedent for online expression in Kenya, raising the burden of proof for state agencies prosecuting "false information" cases.
• Investigative Gaps: The ruling exposes a systemic lack of technical capacity within the DCI to handle complex cybercrime cases, relying on arrests rather than forensics.

The Student vs. The State

For Mokaya, the acquittal ends a nightmare that threatened to derail his education and future. For the state, it is a stark reminder that in the age of the internet, the old tactics of intimidation cannot replace the rigour of evidence. The "fake funeral" image may have been a distasteful prank, but the court has affirmed that proving who posted it requires more than just a suspect in handcuffs.

As Mokaya walked out of the Milimani Law Courts a free man, the message to the authorities was clear: bring evidence, or don't bring the case at all.