Kenya Railways accountant charged with forging payroll, stopping deductions

A Kenya Railways Corporation accountant has been charged with altering the corporation’s payroll system occasioning the loss of Sh317,500 to the company.

Patrick Kareithi Ndegwa, who was charged with two counts of computer forgery and fraud, allegedly used credentials issued to him to stop deductions from his salary, a few months after he was surcharged for yet another offence of gross misconduct, which saw the corporation lose money.

The court heard that he committed the offence between July 2019 and November 2021, by intentionally altering computer data in Kenya Railway’s payroll system.

On the second count, Mr Ndegwa was charged with computer forgery contrary to sections of the Computer Misuse and Cyber Crime. The charge sheet stated that he intentionally altered computer data at the payroll system occasioning the loss of Sh317,500 to the corporation.

A report filed by the police showed that Mr Ndegwa had worked with the corporation for 13 years and in 2016, he was accused of gross misconduct for allegedly misappropriating Sh1.4 million from the State corporation.

He was taken back and reprimanded following a board meeting but was demoted.

Mr Ndegwa was also surcharged and ordered to pay half of the amount that was lost. He agreed for a monthly deduction of Sh5,000 to be made in his payslip until full payment of Sh571,991.

The deductions were made from February 2018 until January 2020 when he allegedly interfered with the system and stopped the deductions but the system continued reflecting the deducted amount.

It later emerged that being an authorised user of the payroll, Mr Ndegwa accessed the system and stopped the deductions for a certain period before it was discovered.

He denied the charge and was ordered to deposit a cash bail of Sh200,000 to secure his release.