A Kenyan court has convicted doomsday preacher Paul Mackenzie and 28 associates over the deaths of 191 people, exposing the deadly consequences of a cult doctrine that allegedly directed followers to starve their children in preparation for meeting Jesus.
The verdict, delivered by Justice Diana Mochache in the coastal city of Mombasa, marks a major development in the Shakahola forest tragedy, where more than 400 bodies were eventually discovered in shallow graves.
According to the BBC, the victims covered by the murder convictions were all children except one, while Mackenzie’s followers were allegedly subjected to teachings that prohibited formal education and portrayed modern medicine as evil.
Delivering her judgment, which lasted eight hours, Mochache said followers regarded Mackenzie as “Jesus’s mouthpiece”, giving him considerable influence over their lives and decisions.
Evidence presented in court described how the sect’s teachings allegedly turned starvation into a religious obligation, with burials in the forest referred to as “weddings” and the dead celebrated as having joined Jesus.
One witness told the court that a pregnant woman had been prevented from nursing her newborn baby, who died 12 days later. The mother was reportedly instructed to fast to death and follow her other children.
A former head of security for the cult, Enos Amanya Ngala, who became a prosecution witness after entering a plea agreement, provided evidence about the group’s activities.
Mackenzie and the other 28 accused had denied the murder charges, maintaining that nobody was forced to die.
The case has left families grappling with devastating losses. Stephen Mwiti, 48, told the BBC that he lost all six of his children in the forest. His former wife was among those convicted alongside Mackenzie.
“I’m a happy man, that all persons have been convicted,” Mwiti said after the verdict, although he had recovered and buried the remains of only one of his children, Samuel.
The scale of the tragedy emerged in 2023, when local herders discovered the first remains in Shakahola forest, near Kenya’s coast. Subsequent investigations uncovered more than 400 bodies, many of them children. Some victims were believed to have died from starvation, while others suffered strangulation or fatal beatings.
Mackenzie established Good News International Ministries in 2003, building a following through church branches and a television station that broadcast his sermons. His teachings reportedly described education as evil, healthcare as contrary to religious doctrine and digital identity cards as the “mark of the devil”.
After the church closed in 2019, he moved to Shakahola forest and encouraged followers to join him there.
Some survivors have described being denied medical treatment. Peter Shukrani, who joined the church as a child, told the BBC that his mother discarded medication he needed because she believed Mackenzie’s teaching that medicine was evil. He said he might have died had he not been rescued.
Despite his experience, Shukrani continued to defend Mackenzie, illustrating the enduring influence the preacher held over some followers even after the deaths came to light.
The case has also raised questions about how the group operated for years before the full scale of the deaths was uncovered, and how vulnerable families became trapped in a system that discouraged education and conventional healthcare.
Mackenzie faces additional legal proceedings relating to terrorism, radicalisation and the denial of education to children. The murder conviction is the first verdict against him on the most serious charges connected to the tragedy.
He is due to be sentenced on November 6
