Fraud –Pastor Ezekiel Odero lost a whopping sh 500,000 to his counterpart Paul Mackenzie.
A Shanzu law court was treated to a drama-like story on how the New Life Prayer Center and Church founder, Ezekiel Odero, lost his thousands in a dubious fake commercial deal from Mackenzie.
On Thursday, May 11, Lawyer Cliff Ombeta detailed how Mr. Mackenzie conned his client a whopping sh 500,000.
This is after Ezekiel deposited the amount to acquire a Tv Channel which Mackenzie had purportedly put on sale.
Ombeta, on Thursday, told the Malindi court how trickster Mackenzie lured Ezekiel into the sh 3 million Tv deal that never was.
On depositing the first sh 500,000 into Mackenzie’s bank account, the latter started complicating the matter and eventually asked for sh 5 million.
“Pastor Ezekiel then went to Mackenzie and after discussions, he agreed to deposit sh 500,000. However, Mackenzie later complicated the situation and asked for more than Ksh3 million which was initially agreed upon,” Ombeta explained.
“Mackenzie then increased the cost of the transaction from sh 3 million to sh 5 million. In response, Pastor Ezekiel declined to continue with the transaction and told Mackenzie that he was no longer interested since he was going to get his own,” Ombeta told the court.
A well-prepared Ombeta also put the State on the defense by asking the court to pile pressure on the prosecution side to take responsibility of anything it had said against his client.
Earlier, the prosecution had claimed that Ezekiel and Mackenzie were historical business friends who shared not only the same spiritual beliefs but also same geographical location.
