A Dutchman’s four-year relationship with a Kenyan woman has ended in a court battle over gifts, including Sh2.2 million he says he sent towards development of a matrimonial home they were to share as a couple after marriage.
But the woman, Ms SL, says the money was voluntarily given as gifts during their relationship and denies promising to marry the foreign national, Mr BD, or build a matrimonial house with him.
The heart of the dispute is an alleged unfulfilled promise to marry, occupation of the house by another man, police bribery and a fight over recovery of the money.
The dispute has since moved from the failed relationship to a criminal case in which Ms SL is accused of cheating and obtaining the money through trickery and a civil suit in which Mr BD is seeking Sh2.4 million compensation and recovery of a three-bedroom storey building from Ms SL in Vikwathani, Bamburi, Mombasa.
The High Court on Friday dismissed Ms SL’s attempt to stop the criminal proceedings, leaving the competing accounts of the relationship, money and property to be dealt with in the cases before the magistrate courts.
According to Ms SL’s account, the relationship began after Mr BD pursued her through relatives from 2019. She described him as a Dutch citizen who visits Kenya about once a year.
From late 2020 to mid-2023, she said, Mr BD used to send her money through M-Pesa, often Sh100, Sh200 or Sh1,000 for airtime or lunch "as his intended girlfriend".
She said Sh70,000 was also sent for the burial of Mr BD’s father, while other amounts were used to roof his own house at Likoni. She said they first met in person towards the end of 2022.
However, the prosecution gave a different account. The DPP said Mr BD told police investigators that their relationship began in 2019, he proposed marriage and they agreed to build a home together.
The criminal charge states that between May 25, 2020 and February 13, 2024, Ms SL allegedly obtained Sh2.2 million by pretending she would build a matrimonial house for them.
Ms SL said the relationship had already changed. In September 2023, she told Mr BD she intended to marry another man.
She said he did not take the news well, and that he threatened her and later went to her home with others and caused disturbance demanding the return of what he had bought her.
She denied agreeing to marry him or build a matrimonial home, saying the Vikwathani house was hers and had been built using her own resources on a plot next to her mother’s house.
Her case is that the money was given voluntarily as gifts within a domestic relationship and that receiving it was no crime. She says Mr BD would not accept the end of the relationship, and that he used the police and the prosecution to pressure her into marrying him and to punish her when she married someone else.
Mr BD, however, denied that narrative and told the court that they agreed to marry and build a home together. He said he sent her money from the Netherlands to buy land and fund construction, with transaction records showing remittances exceeding Sh2 million.
He said his suspicions arose in February 2024 when he visited the property and found Ms SL living there with another man, who chased him away from the house he believed he had helped finance. He said their relationship began in 2019 after he pursued Ms SL through relatives.
The criminal complaint followed after the man complained to the police the Ms SL had defrauded him. He recorded a statement describing a relationship that began in 2019, his proposal of marriage, and a joint decision to build a home, for which he sent money for the purchase of the plot and for construction.
Ms SL said she was arrested at her Vikwathani home on February 29, 2024 by officers from Shelly Beach Police Station.
She said she was released on a Sh20,000 police bond after a prosecutor advised the parties to negotiate, but was re-arrested on March 6 and charged the following day after another prosecutor approved the charge. She spent eight days in remand at Shimo La Tewa.
In addition, she alleged that Mr BD boasted of having bribed the police, the prosecution and even the courts, and there are audio recordings of this and of the investigating officer admitting that the case is not criminal.
The High Court found that the recordings had not been produced, transcribed or authenticated.
“This court cannot act on evidence that a party says exists but has chosen not to produce,” Justice Ngaah Jairus said.
The judge rejected the argument that the dispute was purely a failed relationship or property matter.
“Whether the money was a gift or was obtained by a fraudulent trick is precisely the kind of disputed question of fact, which must be decided by the trial court after hearing evidence tested by cross-examination,” Justice Ngaah said.
A civil case over the property was filed on May 29, 2024, after the criminal complaint and charge. Ms SL argued that the property dispute belonged in the civil court.
The High Court said the existence of a civil case did not by itself require the criminal proceedings to stop. It found no evidence that the criminal process had been used to revive a failed civil claim.
The judge also noted that Mr BD described Ms SL as a prospective wife in the criminal case but as an agent or forewoman paid to supervise construction in the civil case.
"The inconsistency between the Interested Party’s description of the Petitioner as a prospective wife in the criminal case and as a paid forewoman in the civil suit is a legitimate point," said the judge.
It dismissed Ms SL’s petition and ordered the criminal case to proceed, while stressing that it had not decided whether she was guilty or innocent.
“Nothing in this judgment decides the guilt or innocence of the Petitioner, and all her defences remain open to her before the trial court,” Justice Ngaah said.
