Paul Mackenzie, the leader of a Kenyan cult who told his followers to starve themselves to death, has been found guilty of murdering 190 children and one adult. The verdict, delivered at Mombasa High Court, brings a measure of accountability for the deaths that occurred near his doomsday sect in the Shakahola Forest.
Mackenzie, who ran the Good News International Church, had told his followers the world was ending and that they would go to heaven if they starved themselves. The court heard how parents at times stopped their children from eating.
Arrest and Investigation
The former taxi driver was arrested alongside 30 other people after a tip-off to police revealed extensive shallow graves near the sect's location. More than 400 bodies were recovered, but only 26 were able to be identified due to the severe decomposition of most victims.
Mackenzie denied the murder charges, saying he did not force the victims to starve. The court rejected that argument, and investigations into the remaining deaths are ongoing.
Court Proceedings
Mackenzie appeared in court wearing a striped polo shirt and red trousers, sitting alongside his wife, a co-accused. Justice Diana Kavedza Mochache told the hearing, which lasted more than eight hours, that in some cases children were isolated and denied food while their parents watched.
Family members of some of the deceased gathered to hear the judgment. Francis Wanje, 62, who lost eight family members including two grandchildren to the cult, said: "It has been really a heavy thing [for] us as a family, and it has really taken us very far in terms of psychological problems... I was hoping for this particular day."
Planned Starvation and Further Charges
It is understood that Mackenzie planned the mass starvation in three phases: first children, then women and young men, and finally the remaining men. He told families that this was how they could go to Heaven before the world ended.
In March 2023, a local told police that his brother and wife had starved their children to death in the forest on Mackenzie's orders. Mackenzie was arrested but released on bail. He then brought forward the date on which he told his followers the world would end. He was arrested again in April 2023, and authorities began combing through the forest more systematically and exhuming mass graves.
Mackenzie faces other charges over the forest deaths, including terrorism-related ones, which he has denied. Prosecutors said that while Mackenzie was in detention, he directed the deaths of 52 people in Kwa Binzaro village, about 30 km (18 miles) from Shakahola. He pleaded not guilty in that case.
