JUDGMENT
The appellant was charged together with another employee of the Customs and Excise Department at Kisumu, and with another person who was acquitted, on three separate counts and one alternative count of fraudulent false accounting relating to the theft of 15,133 spark plugs or the proceeds thereof, contrary to section 280 of the Penal Code. The appellant was at the material time employed within the public service as an examining officer and was the warehouse-keeper at Kisumu, and the third accused was the cashier at the cash office, which is situated within the Post Office. Each was convicted and received eighteen months’ imprisonment.
When goods are seized by the customs authority, it is their practice to sell them by auction from time to time, if the importers to whom they are said to belong do not show cause against the seizure, after due notification in the Kenya Official Gazette. A register of the goods seized was kept (Ex 11), and there was acceptable evidence that the app…