▲ Paul Nthenge Mackenzie, who was found guilty on charges of starving 191 people to death in Kenya
A pseudo-religious leader in Kenya, Africa, who drove hundreds of people, including children, to death by starvation, has been found guilty about three years after his crimes came to light.
According to British broadcaster BBC and local daily The Kenya Times on the 19th (local time), Justice Diana Kavedza Mochache of the Mombasa High Court found Paul Nthenge Mackenzie and 28 accomplices guilty of charges including the murder of 191 people, consisting of 190 children and one adult.
The court is scheduled to sentence them on November 6 next month.
Mackenzie was arrested three years ago in April 2023 in the eastern coastal city of Malindi, Kenya, on charges of coercing followers of his Good News International Church to starve themselves to death in order to meet Jesus, leading to a mass starvation event.
When police searched the Shakahola Forest near the church, the number of recovered bodies exceeded 400 by the following year. The incident, dubbed the "Shakahola Forest Massacre," shocked both Kenya and the international community.
Mackenzie was initially indicted on murder charges regarding 191 victims whose identities have been confirmed.
He was accused of forcing parents who followed him to starve their children to death.
He was additionally indicted in connection with 52 more bodies discovered in January of this year.
Prosecutors stated that, according to the investigation results, Mackenzie enforced a so-called "hierarchy of death," claiming that children should die first, followed by adolescents, women, and men. Most of the children died of starvation, though some also died from suffocation or trauma.
While Mackenzie and his accomplices denied the charges, the court announced today that the charges against all of them had been proven and their criminal liability was established.
Mackenzie, who founded his church in 2003, was previously arrested in 2017 but acquitted, and was arrested again in 2019 in connection with the deaths of two children, but was reportedly released on bail.
(Photo: AP, Yonhap News)
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