Kenyan court sentences cult leader Paul Mackenzie to 200 years over Shakahola deaths

The sentence and the verdict

Judge Diana Mochache of the High Court in Mombasa sentenced Paul Mackenzie, a self-proclaimed pastor and former taxi driver, to 200 years in prison on Friday, 6 November. The sentence combines 100 years for starvation deaths of 183 people with 100 years for eight people who were killed directly. Twenty-eight co-accused also received long prison terms, although the BBC gave the number of co-defendants as 27. The court had found all defendants guilty on 19 October, when they had pleaded not guilty and insisted that nobody had been forced to die. Mackenzie's lawyer has announced an appeal.

The charges and the court's findings

Prosecutors said Mackenzie had persuaded followers that the end of the world was imminent and that they could reach Jesus by fasting to death, including letting their children starve. According to the charges, victims were placed in a 'structured hierarchy of death' in which children would die first, then adolescents and women, and men last. Most of the children had starved, while others were suffocated, strangled or struck severely on the head. Witness testimony said anyone who searched for food was beaten. The court rejected the defence's claim that nobody had been forced to fast. Prosecutors had asked for the death penalty, which Kenya's penal code still provides for but which has not been carried out since 1987.

Discovery and the 2023 investigation

Investigators first found bodies in April 2023 in the Shakahola forest near the coastal town of Malindi, after human rights groups alerted the authorities and some followers were rescued from starvation. Mackenzie, a former taxi driver, was arrested that same month. Searches turned up hundreds of bodies in mass graves, and some of the 429 victims mentioned in one report remain unidentified. Mackenzie had been arrested twice before and released again, which prompted calls in Kenya for stricter rules on religious groups.

The church and its followers

Mackenzie led the Good News International Church, which Deutsche Welle says had been operating since 2003. Followers lived on his ranch in the Shakahola forest, where burials were called 'weddings' and deaths were presented as joyful events because the dead were said to be symbolically marrying Jesus. The judge said the followers believed Mackenzie was a spokesman of Jesus. The court found that people who opposed his teachings were beaten, and some were killed.

Counts and what comes next

The counts differ by scope. The trial concerned 191 deaths, including 190 children and one adult, while reports put the number of bodies found above 400. Kenya's National Commission on Human Rights counted 448 bodies in the forest.

Deaths in the trial191

Children among the trial deaths190

Bodies counted by Kenya's National Commission on Human Rights448

Deaths in the trial

191

Children among the trial deaths

190

Bodies counted by Kenya's National Commission on Human Rights

448

Data from the article text

Mackenzie's lawyer has said he will appeal the sentence. Prosecutors had asked for life imprisonment for his co-accused. Calls for tighter regulation of religious groups in Kenya followed the case.