A Kenyan court is set to deliver a judgement in a mass murder case involving doomsday preacher Paul Mackenzie. He and 29 of his followers are charged with the murder of 191 children.
Prosecutors allege the cult forced children to starve to death so that they could “meet Jesus”. The group’s doomsday teaching held that education was forbidden and modern medicine was evil. Mackenzie and the other 29 accused have all pleaded not guilty to murder and have repeatedly insisted that nobody was forced to die.
Charges and legal cases against the cult leader
Mackenzie’s former head of security, Enos Amanya Ngala, was initially accused but later entered a plea deal and became a witness for the prosecution. Mackenzie and other cult leaders also face a series of other legal cases, including charges of terrorism, radicalisation and denying education to children.
This verdict, however, concerns the most serious charges against the pastor: murder. In the 298 pages of charge documents in the current case, all 191 alleged victims are described as children.
Many of the bodies remain unidentified because of their advanced state of decomposition. In court documents, several are referred to as “unknown male child” and identified by where their grave was located and when it was found.
Shallow graves in Shakahola forest
Authorities said more than 400 bodies were found in shallow graves in Shakahola forest, near the Kenyan coast, where Mackenzie had led followers from across the country. Seventeen men were hired from the nearby town to dig up the graves, and some were paid just $8 (£6) a day.
One of the gravediggers, James, described what they found. “Every grave we found had at least three bodies,” he said. “Some of the remains were of children as young as a few weeks old.”
Gravediggers also described some of the children’s bodies as having their hands and legs tied and their bodies wrapped in bedsheets. Another gravedigger, Salim Karisa, said that some of the people carried out of the forest had been so frail that they died in their arms.
Some of the remains belong to people who were known to the local community. Followers regularly went to nearby Shakahola town for supplies and to fetch water from the River Galana, which flows through the town. Karisa said that followers were sometimes carried into the forest on motorbikes, but added, “it was so planned and secretive that nobody could tell what was happening inside.”
Families and survivors describe the cult’s grip
Stephen Mwiti, 48, said he lost all six of his children to the cult. He said that when he went to confront Mackenzie at his house, he saw “many bald women and tens of children” around the pastor. Mackenzie banned make-up and hairstyles, and women were told to shave their heads or leave their hair unkempt. Mwiti’s former wife is one of those accused alongside Mackenzie.
“All six of my children died in Shakahola forest,” Mwiti said, holding a photograph of his family. He said he had only found and buried the remains of his son Samuel. Pointing to a dusty television and cable box in his home in the coastal town of Malindi, 70km (43 miles) from Shakahola, he said that was where Mackenzie’s teaching first entered his household.
Peter Shukrani, 23, said his mother moved with him to the forest. He had joined Mackenzie’s church at the age of eight and described the pastor as his “spiritual father”. Shukrani fell ill in the forest, and his condition worsened because medication was banned. He said his mother threw away the medicine he was meant to take because she believed only God could heal him.
Shukrani was rescued from the forest in March 2023, when the first remains were discovered by local herders. He said he would have died had he not been rescued. Even so, he described Mackenzie as “a good person who cares for me”, and insisted that the pastor did not force anyone to fast. “People made those choices by themselves because of their beliefs,” he said.
Dan Mackenzie, the pastor’s son, who said he worked as a cameraperson at the church, takes a very different view. He said his father should be found guilty of murder. “He was the leader, he was someone who they were looking [up to]. So he is a murderer of mass killing.”
How the church built its following
Mackenzie established Good News International Ministries in 2003. Over the following 16 years, the church grew in popularity and drew thousands of followers across its branches in Kenya. It ran a television station, Times TV, which broadcast his sermons from the church in Malindi.
His End Days sermons included conspiracy theories that described education as “evil”, healthcare as “against the doctrine”, and digital identity cards as “the mark of the devil”. The main church shut down in 2019, after which Mackenzie moved to Shakahola forest and urged his followers to join him there.
