The Directorate of Criminal Investigations has cracked an examination fraud syndicate involved in the sale of ongoing KCSE.
The masterminds of the high-level examination fraud have been found to be college students in four institutions of higher learning in Kenya.
The main suspect has been identified as Gideon Kibet Tanui alias Evans Kipruto, an Information Technology student at Baringo Technical College.
Detectives landed on Kibet in his rented room next to the college on March 15, at around 10:30am, while he was busy administering English paper 2 and Chemistry paper 1.
The suspect was administering the paper to a Whatsapp group with 70 members and a Telegram group with 17,000 members. He was dishing the papers at Ksh 500.
"The IT student whose Mpesa account had over Sh10,000 at the time of his arrest, was also operating a separate KCB account at Kabarnet branch, where he immediately transferred the received cash from his Mpesa to avoid reversals," DCI reports.
His arrest led the detectives to Kevin Kiprotich Langat, a bachelor of arts student in Swahili, at Rongo University, who was arrested on Thursday.
Langat who was in constant communication with the first suspect had forwarded the English paper to him. It is at Rongo University where a wider syndicate of the examination fraudsters existed, in a Telegram group dubbed the ‘Kale Group’ created under the name ‘Bailing Out’ among other groups.
Langat led detectives to yet another culprit, a first year political science and swahili comrade, identified as Justice Leting, who at the time of arrest was busy distributing the Kiswahili paper and preparing answers for the Chemistry practical paper.
The DCI found out that the syndicate is being led by crooked government officials at county levels. An elaborate web of fraudsters comprising of school heads, security agents, parents and college students, in some parts of the country have conspired to give lazy students unfair advantage over their counterparts who worked hard and prepared for their examinations.
In some instances, the examination containers are opened hours before the set time, to supply the examination papers to university and college students, for development of answers that are later sold to candidates.
Detectives have already zeroed in on the masterminds of this high level fraud, believed to be hiding in Nandi hills.
The beneficiaries of the examination fraud are also being pursued for action.
"Cyber & digital forensics experts are analyzing all the subscribers in the Whatsapp & Telegrams groups involved in the Examination malpractice for legal action, as documents examination & handwritings sleuths complement their efforts," DCI reports.
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