The release of Julius Wambua Musyoka from Kamiti Maximum Prison a few days was celebrated.
It was long overdue and well-deserved for a man who had spent more than 3,000 days in a cage for a crime he did not commit.
Musyoka’s story first blew the headlines in March 2019 after Citizen TV aired his story of wrongful incarceration. He was staring at a lifetime sentence for allegedly defiling his daughter who was then a teenager aged 16.
Since his imprisonment in 2011, he has called Kamiti home for nine years. It has been a journey of despair but at the same time, one that brought him closer to God.
More than a year after his story was aired, the case went back to the court and month after month, he looked forward to the day he will.
Finally, he was released by Machakos High Court judge George Odunga on a Ksh30,000 cash bail.
He was welcomed back to civilian life by his daughter who issued a false testimony against him nine years.
But she is the same daughter, Dorcas Mwende who spoke of how she was coerced to issue false testimony against by her mother.
With his release, the 56-year-old has no place to go. Where he once called home is no more.
“Although I am a free man now, I am forced by circumstances to start my life from the scratch. I lost everything in the nine years I was in jail,” he told the Saturday Nation.
“I am now concerned about getting a place to call home.”
Mwende accused her mother Jackline Nzilani of coaching her in what the court heard was a case of “settling scores” between her mother and her father.
Since his incarceration, he lost his land where he had built his home.
