Kenyan doomsday cult leader sentenced to 200 years for murders of 191 people

The leader of a Kenyan doomsday cult linked to the deaths of more than 400 people has been sentenced to 200 years in prison for the murders of 191 people.

The High Court in Kenya’s coastal city of Mombasa issued the sentence for Pastor Paul Mackenzie.

He was convicted of murdering 190 children and one adult after he ordered his followers to starve themselves to death in order to meet Jesus.

Mackenzie is also facing terrorism and manslaughter charges for the more than 200 other victims, as well as child abuse and torture charges in two other courts.

Justice Diana Kavedza said that Mackenzie, leader of the Good News International Church, bore the “primary criminal culpability” for relocating his followers to a remote location and ordering them to fast to death.

Mackenzie was charged with the murders alongside 28 of his followers, including guards who enforced his fasting directives and gravediggers who helped conceal the mass graves.

All denied the charges, except for one person who confessed and pleaded for leniency.

On October 19, the court found all 29 of the accused guilty of the murder of 191 people.

In 2023, more than 400 bodies were exhumed from shallow graves on the 800-acre Chakama Ranch in the coastal Kilifi County, where Mackenzie’s followers lived in mud huts, away from the scrutiny of local communities and authorities.

More than 60 bodies were positively identified and reburied by their relatives, while many others remain unidentified and unclaimed.

During the sentencing, the judge said that 183 victims died of starvation, defined as a complete lack of food, and the other eight were classified as murder by direct homicide.

She said the killings were “cold and calculated” and dismissed claims by some of the accused that the loss of their own children altered the fact that they had participated in the killings of many other children.

She said that the perpetrators did not show remorse and declared they were ready to fast to death as well.

During the sentencing, Mackenzie often smiled and chatted with his assistant pastor, Smart Mwakalama, who was sentenced to 160 years in prison.

All of those who were convicted have been granted 14 days to file an appeal.

The prosecution had argued for the death penalty for Mackenzie and life imprisonment for his accomplices.

Defence lawyer Lawrence Obonyo, who represents Mackenzie and several others who were convicted, told the Associated Press that he had already launched an appeal.

He said that the decision was “circling around the constitution to give a sentence that is unattainable” since the sentences of between 160 and 200 years amount to life sentences.

A father of seven, Suleiman Ziro, who travelled 75 miles for the sentencing, lost six of his children and his wife to the cult in 2023.

He said that the sentence was not enough especially because he has yet to recover the bodies of his loved ones, calling for the death penalty in the case.

Mackenzie’s son, Dan Mackenzie, said that he felt sorry for his father over the conviction, but it was “justice served to the victims”.

He said that he escaped by “rebelling” against his father’s teachings and was often punished for it, but was glad he survived. Two of his younger brothers and three sisters were rescued and are currently at a children’s home.

Those sentenced to death in Kenyan courts serve a life sentence. Kenya’s last execution was in 1987.