Residents lynch killer’s wife and mother

Burnt homestead of a man alleged to have killed 12 people in Muono village in Mwingi Central, Kitui County on July 4, 2013. Photo/BILLY MUTAI

What you need to know:

  • Revenge attacks follow night gang raid on remote village that left 12 people dead
  • Orgy of violence as gang member’s family burnt to death in granary

Angry residents on Friday lynched three people in a revenge attack following a gang raid that left 12 dead in the Nyanyaa area in Kitui County.

Among those killed were the wife and mother of an ex-convict who allegedly led a five-man gang that unleashed an orgy of violence on the village on Wednesday night.

The third victim was a suspected gangster who was found hiding in the bush.

Ms Susan Mbonzo, a retired teacher, said the villagers, led by youths, stormed the gang leader’s homestead and ordered his mother and wife into a grass-thatched granary before setting it on fire.

When the Nation visited the home, the bodies were still in the granary while smoke billowed from two other houses that had been set ablaze.

“What angered the youths was the discovery that the gang leader’s mother was still communicating with her son and had prepared a meal of fried chicken which she and her daughter-in-law intended to take to his hiding place,” Ms Mbonzo said.

The angry youths accused the two women of feasting while the village was mourning the dozen deaths.

Yesterday’s deaths bring to six the number of revenge killings arising from the raid despite police appeals to the youth to arrest the suspects and hand them over for prosecution. 

Mwingi Central MP Joe Mutambu, who toured the area accompanied by deputy Administration Police Commandant Peter Pamba, had offered a Sh100,000 reward to the youths for the arrest the suspects.

On Thursday, the villagers lynched three of the gang members after pursuing them for about 50 kilometres.

Only one more suspect, the ex-convict, who is also said to be behind a string of armed robberies in the area, is still at large and is believed to be hiding in the nearby Endui Hills.

Yesterday, tension remained high in the area as youths armed with pangas, bows and arrows combed the Endui Hills.

Kitui County Police Commander Cheruto Githinji, who was leading the hunt for the killers, appealed to residents to stop taking the law into their hands.