Family refuses to bury murderer

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JOSEPH KANYI | NATION Residents of Satima village in Kieni West attend a burial ceremony of three family members on Saturday. The three were killed by a relative a week ago and buried in a house.  

By JOHN NJAGI jnjagi@ke.nationmedia.com
Posted  Sunday, August 21  2011 at  22:00

IN SUMMARY

• Task of burying man who killed kin now left to his father as victims are laid to rest

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A family has declined to conduct a burial for a relative who killed three family members.

Instead, the family held a burial ceremony for the three victims of the killings in which the 25-year-old man killed his grandparents and younger brother. (Read: Three bodies exhumed from house )

Ms Milka Njeri, 65, Mr Bidan Kimani, 71, and Mr Antony Muiruri, 14, were buried at Satima village in Kieni West District over the weekend.

But the body of Stephen Karanja was missing at the funeral.

A member of the burial committee and area councillor Samuel Wambugu said the family would not bother itself with Karanja’s burial.

“No one wanted to bother himself with burying a criminal. The committee was already burdened with arranging a send off for three individuals,” he said.

The killer was lynched by angry residents after the three bodies were discovered buried inside a house that he shared with his younger brother.

The family has now left the task of burying the killer to his father who hails from Maragua, as they will have nothing to do with his interment.

Karanja murdered the three by hitting them with sharp, heavy objects on the head, according to an autopsy report.

At the burial speakers condemned the killings and castigated parents for abdicating their responsibility of bringing up their children.

“The trend where young people leave the role of upbringing children for their parents is worrying,” Mr John Githinji, the head-teacher of Rabura Primary School where Antony was a pupil, said.

Kieni MP Nemesyus Warugongo asked residents to carefully vet strangers to ensure they had no criminal intent.

Before killing the three, Karanja is said to have pretended to be his grandfather’s herdsman.

“There is rising insecurity in this area and people need to report suspicious characters to the authorities,” he said.