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Kenyan doomsday cult leader charged with murder of 200 followers

Published

3 months ago

February 6, 2024

Pastor Paul Nthenge Mackenzie

Kenyan doomsday cult leader charged with murder of 200 followers

A Kenyan court on Tuesday charged the leader of a starvation cult and dozens of suspected accomplices with murder over the deaths of nearly 200 people in a forest near the Indian Ocean.

Self-proclaimed pastor, Paul Mackenzie, who has already been charged with terrorism, manslaughter as well as child torture and cruelty, is alleged to have incited hundreds of his acolytes to starve to death in order to “meet Jesus”.

On Tuesday, Mackenzie and 29 other suspects pleaded not guilty to 191 counts of murder, according to court documents seen by AFP.

A 31st suspect was deemed to lack the mental fitness to stand trial and ordered to return to the Malindi High Court in a month’s time.

The cult leader has pleaded not guilty to all the charges against him.

He was arrested in April last year after bodies were found in the Shakahola forest, with the grisly discoveries provoking horror across the world.

Autopsies revealed that the majority of the 429 victims had died of hunger.

But others, including children, appeared to have been strangled, beaten or suffocated.

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The case dubbed the “Shakahola forest massacre”, led the government to flag the need for tighter control of fringe denominations.

A largely Christian nation, Kenya has struggled to regulate unscrupulous churches and cults that dabble in criminality.

Court documents have described Good News International Ministries founded by Mackenzie as “an organised criminal group (which) engaged in organised criminal activities”, leading to the death of hundreds of followers.

Questions have been raised about how Mackenzie managed to evade law enforcement despite a history of extremism and previous legal cases.

A Senate Commission of Inquiry reported in October that the father of seven had faced charges in 2017 for extreme preaching.

He was acquitted of charges of radicalisation in 2017 for illegally providing school teaching after rejecting the formal educational system that he claimed was not in line with the Bible.

In 2019, he was also accused of links to the death of two children believed to have been starved, suffocated and then buried in a shallow grave in Shakahola. He was released on bail pending trial.

There are more than 4,000 churches registered in the East African country of 53 million people, according to government figures.

Previous efforts to regulate religious institutions in Kenya have been fiercely opposed as attempts to undermine constitutional guarantees for the division of church and state.

Kenyan doomsday cult leader charged with murder of 200 followers

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Fake doctor arrested in Lagos after performing surgery, practising for three years

Published

3 hours ago

May 7, 2024

Trends Admin

Lagos Police Public Relations Officer, Benjamin Hundeyin

Fake doctor arrested in Lagos after performing surgery, practising for three years

Operatives of the Lagos State Police Command have arrested a fake medical doctor practising in the Ikorodu area of the state, with a forged certificate from Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Osun State.

According to a video by the TVC posted on Tuesday, the police said they discovered about 200 patient cards with the fake medical practitioner, Tayo Shakirudeeen, an indigene of Abeokuta, Ogun State.

Shakirudeen said he had treated malaria, typhoid, infections and performed operations on children suffering from appendix, after he learnt it where he worked as a Nursing Assistant at The Jones Hospital, Ojokoro along Ikorodu Road.

Asked how many years he had been treating patients with a fake certificate, he said three years claiming that it was his first time performing a proper surgery.

He also said it was a patient he treated that came with the policemen to arrest him, as he regretted his actions.

“I performed vital signs and abdominal scans. Then after confirmation, you do PCV (packed cell volume) and then you prepare the patient for the surgery. You clean the stomach with antiseptic Dettol with water. So after that, you give some anesthesia injection before starting the surgery,” Shakirudden said.

He used a surgical blade “to dissect the stomach, it’s appendix after opening the stomach then you cut the appendix after cutting the stomach then you suction the appendix then you suction the flesh fat and the skin then you pack it with gauze and apply plaster.”

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It was gathered that he only holds SSCE from Majidun Grammar School, as he said he was arrested, “after performing the surgery, the patient has been discharged home. So after like three months, the patient came with the police to arrest me.”

He said there were no complications after treating the patient so he did not know the reason why the patent came back with the police.

“I charged one hundred fifty thousand, and I have six workers. My hospital is located in Ikorodu. It’s a new site but somewhere close to Elepe Estate. I regret every bit of my action so I would never advise anyone or if there’s anyone that is still hiding somewhere and doing such a thing they should desist from it,” he added.

Shakirudeen’s hospital is Skyline Medical Centre and noted that he is a married man with three children

Speaking about the certificate the police found with him, he said, “It’s a forged certificate from Obafemi Awolowo MBBS, Medicine, and Surgery. Nobody taught me, but I used to help my boss when he was performing the surgery.”

“To dissect the stomach, it’s appendix after opening the stomach then you cut the appendix after cutting the stomach then you suction the appendix, then you suction the flesh fat and the skin then you pack it with gauze and apply plaster,” he added.

Fake doctor arrested in Lagos after performing surgery, practising for three years

metro

BREAKING: Police reportedly arrest Dunamis testifier, Anyim Vera

Published

3 hours ago

May 7, 2024

Trends Admin

Anyim Vera

BREAKING: Police reportedly arrest Dunamis testifier, Anyim Vera

Dunamis Testifier and a Bsc Law Celebrity, has been arrested and detained by the Nigeria Police Force for breaching etiquette.

Anyim Vera, who went viral recently after she was accused of giving false testimony in Dunamis church, has hinted at meeting singer Davido and comedian Sabinus over her self-acclaimed celebrity status.

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In a video that emerged online, Anyim, during her testimony in the church, said she graduated with a “Bsc in Law” from the National Open University of Nigeria.

She was however interrupted by Enenche who said she was lying. The pastor also questioned the credibility of the woman’s testimony while he chided her on how she spoke.

BREAKING: Police reportedly arrest Dunamis testifier, Anyim Vera

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Gunmen kidnap 13 persons in Abuja, demand N900m ransom

Published

4 hours ago

May 7, 2024

Trends Admin

FCT Police Command Spokesperson, SP Adeh Josephine

Gunmen kidnap 13 persons in Abuja, demand N900m ransom

Suspected gunmen raided Piko, a secluded town in Abuja’s Bwari area council, and kidnapped 13 people.

It was reported that the incident, which began at midnight on Sunday in the village, continued more than an hour without being challenged by either the vigilante group or other security forces.

According to a close community source, Chief John Jatau, the village’s Maidakin, has verified that 10 residents, including four nomadic Fulani herders, were kidnapped from his domain.

He noted that out of the four Fulani people, one escaped from the kidnappers’ custody.

While he said that the kidnappers had demanded a ransom of N900 million, he also gave the names of the kidnapped victims from his community.

According to him, the kidnap victims from the community that are still with their abductors are Nuhu Anyiwoyi, Emmanuel Nuhu, Danjuma Ali, Parisa Numa, Ezekiel Jatau, Shekwosa Ezekiel, Roseline Samuel, Salome Jacob, Abyelo Ezra, and Ezra Male.

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The source said, “The kidnapping incident occurred last night Sunday 05/05/2024, at about 11 pm. The kidnappers raided the village for about one hour without any response, or reaction from the community or outsiders, the major challenge the community faced last night in terms of communication to others was as a result of no telecommunication network in the village, so they picked people’s house to house, from the community they picked about 13 people, and later release three.

“The Madakin Piko informed me that they (gunmen) have called and they said they need the ramson of N900,000,000 (nine hundred million naira). They picked about four Fulani people and one of them is released.”

All possible efforts to reach the FCT Police Public Relations Officer, SP Josephine Adeh, proved abortive as she neither replied to messages nor picked up calls placed to her for clarification on the incident.