The leader of a Kenyan Christian sect has been found guilty of murdering 190 children.
Paul Mackenzie was convicted Monday, along with around 30 other suspects, for the deaths of 191 people, all but one of whom were children, in the Shakahola forest in eastern Kenya.
The court found that the deaths were the result of an “organized system in which religious teachings and an established hierarchy were used to direct and enforce a death fast among Mackenzie’s supporters,” Kenya’s attorney general’s office said.
“The fast was implemented sequentially, starting with children, while guards controlled movements and prevented followers from escaping,” the office said in a statement.
Mackenzie, in his early 50s, and his co-defendants were charged with the murders in 2024 after hundreds of children’s bodies were exhumed from Shakahola Forest, where Mackenzie and his associates were accused of leading a death cult.
Authorities began digging up bodies in Shakahola Forest in April 2023. So far, they have recovered 429 bodies. Other charges could follow.
Mackenzie, who led the Good News International Church, was accused of leading a doomsday cult in which he ordered his followers to starve themselves and their children so they could reach heaven and meet Jesus, CNN previously reported.
Autopsy results showed that many of the bodies found had died of starvation while others showed signs of blunt force trauma and strangulation.
Gn world
