Kenya cult leader Paul Mackenzie jailed for 200 years over Shakahola starvation murders

A court in Mombasa, Kenya, on Friday (November 6) sentenced cult leader Paul Nthenge Mackenzie to 200 years in prison for the murder of 191 people, 190 of them children. The judge imposed two consecutive 100-year terms — one for murder by starvation and one for direct homicide — meaning the 50-year-old will spend the rest of his life behind bars.

Two 100-year terms to run consecutively

Justice Diana Kavedza handed down the sentence at the High Court in Mombasa: 100 years for murder by starvation and 100 years for direct homicide, to run one after the other, for a total of 200 years. Mackenzie and 28 co-defendants were convicted on October 19 on 191 counts of murder. Prosecutors had sought the death penalty, but the judge declined, noting that Kenya has carried out no execution since 1987; CNN reported that the judge also said a death sentence could strengthen the convicts' belief that dying would reunite them with Jesus.

28 co-defendants jailed for 10 to 160 years

The 28 co-defendants were sentenced at the same time: 15 received 160 years each, 10 received 140 years each, one received 100 years, and two received 10 years each. One of them had reached a plea deal with prosecutors, admitting all 191 counts of murder; Mackenzie's assistant pastor, Smart Mwakalama, received 160 years. All those sentenced have 14 days to appeal.

Starved to death: 190 of the 191 victims were children

The court found that 183 people died of enforced starvation, including 182 children and one adult, while eight children were killed by direct violence, including suffocation, strangulation and head injuries. Mackenzie led the Good News International Church and preached that the world would end in August 2023, ordering followers to fast so they could meet Jesus before the end. In 2019, after his church in Malindi was shut down by the authorities, he moved his followers to Shakahola Forest in Kilifi County. In April 2023, police began uncovering shallow graves in the forest, exposing a tragedy that shocked the country.

448 bodies recovered; another case still pending

The 191 deaths in this trial are not the whole toll. The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights says 448 bodies were ultimately recovered from Shakahola Forest, and Mackenzie is also accused over the deaths of 52 people at a separate site about 30 kilometres away, bringing the suspected total to about 500. That case is still pending.

Three years to conviction; questions over oversight

More than three years passed between the discovery of the bodies in April 2023 and the sentencing. Kenyan commentators said the verdict brings long-overdue justice for the families, but also leaves questions about oversight failures: how a sect could live in a forest for years while hundreds of people died without timely intervention.

A father who lost six children

The court also heard from families. Stephen Mwiti, 48, said his six children were starved to death in Shakahola, and his wife is among the convicted co-defendants. For many families, the sentence closes one chapter, but the bodies recovered from the forest far outnumber those in this trial, and accountability is not yet complete.

(Sources: Reuters, Associated Press, CNN, Pulse Kenya, Channel 15 News.)