191 Murders, 190 of Them Children: Kenya Cult Leader Paul Mackenzie Convicted
October 20, 2026 · Frisian News
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
A Kenyan court found Paul Mackenzie guilty on 191 counts of murder on 19 October, 190 of the victims children, after prosecutors said he ordered followers to starve their children to death at his Shakahola forest compound.
A Kenyan court found Paul Mackenzie guilty on 191 counts of murder on 19 October, 190 of the victims children. Justice Diana Mochache delivered her verdict in an eight-hour sitting at the Mombasa high court. Twenty-eight co-accused leaders of his Good News International Church were also convicted. All had pleaded not guilty.
Prosecutors said Mackenzie ran what CBS News reported as a "structured hierarchy of death": children first, then teenagers, then women, then men. Post-mortems showed the children died mainly from starvation, but also, CBS News reports, from "asphyxia, neck compression and traumatic head injury." Gravediggers paid $8 a day told the BBC they found graves holding 12 children at a time, bodies "arranged like clothes, one on top of another," some with "hands and legs tied and bodies wrapped in bedsheets."
Mackenzie established Good News International Ministries in 2003. The BBC reports the church drew thousands of followers across Kenya and ran a television station, Times TV, broadcasting from Malindi. His sermons described education as "evil," healthcare as "against the doctrine," and digital identity cards as "the mark of the devil." By 2019 the main church had closed and Mackenzie moved followers to an 800-acre ranch in Shakahola forest, according to CBS News.
Kenyan authorities had Mackenzie under scrutiny years before the mass graves were found. Police searched his premises in 2017 and arrested him on radicalisation charges, CBS News and the Guardian report, but he was acquitted. He was arrested again in 2019 over two child deaths, then released on bail, CBS News reports. After his first arrest in March 2023, the Guardian reports, he brought forward the date on which he told followers the world would end. Police arrested him again in April 2023 and began systematic exhumation of mass graves.
The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights put the total death toll at 429, CBS News reports. The Guardian reports that of more than 400 bodies recovered from Shakahola forest, only 26 could be identified. Several court documents refer to victims as "unknown male child," identified by grave location and discovery date, the BBC reported. In January, Mackenzie was charged over a further 52 bodies found at Kwa Binzaro village, roughly 18 miles from Shakahola, according to the Guardian.
Kenya's president, William Ruto, said in 2023 that government agencies should have been able to prevent the deaths and took personal responsibility, the Guardian reported. The Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions called the verdict "momentous." Director Renson Ingonga told reporters, as CBS News reported: "Getting a conviction of such counts...is not something that comes that easily." Francis Wanje, 62, who lost eight family members including two grandchildren, told AFP before the verdict: "We are expecting a ruling that will be a lesson to the whole public, so that such kinds of things will not happen again." Stephen Mwiti, 48, who lost all six of his children, told the BBC: "I'm a happy man, that all persons have been convicted."
Following the case, calls grew for tighter regulation of religious organisations in Kenya. Mackenzie had been arrested twice and released twice before the full scale of the killings became clear. He still faces separate charges of terrorism and radicalisation. Sentencing is set for 6 November.
Twice arrested, twice released, 429 dead.
Sources
Published October 20, 2026 · Frisian News