Autopsies of corpses found in a forest in southeastern Kenya, where members of an evangelical sect practicing extreme fasting were meeting, revealed missing organs on some bodies, according to a court document seen by AFP on Tuesday.
More than a hundred bodies, most of them children, have so far been found in the investigation into the "Shakahola Forest Massacre", the revelation of which has sparked fear and incomprehension in this religious country in East Africa.
Fasting "to meet Jesus"
According to autopsies performed on 112 bodies, most of the victims died of starvation, presumably after following the sermons of Paul Nthenge Mackenzie, a self-proclaimed pastor of the International Church of Good News who advocated fasting "to meet Jesus". Some victims - including children - were strangled, beaten or suffocated, the head of forensic operations, Dr Johansen Oduor, said last week.
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Autopsy reports have found missing organs on some of the bodies of victims who have so far been exhumed, "reveals a court document consulted Tuesday AFP, evoking "a well-coordinated trafficking of human organs involving several actors", without further details. In this document dated Monday, the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) requests the freezing of bank accounts of Pastor Ezekiel Odero, arrested on April 28 in this case and released on bail Thursday.
'Huge cash transactions'
According to the DCI, this influential pastor received "huge cash transactions" from sums paid by Mackenzie worshippers who had asked them to sell their properties. A Nairobi court on Monday ordered the freezing of more than 20 accounts belonging to Ezekiel Odero for 30 days. The search for bodies and mass graves, suspended due to bad weather, resumed Tuesday in Shakahola forest.
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Search and rescue efforts ... are continuing," said Interior Minister Kithure Kindiki, who was at the scene. Pastor Mackenzie will be prosecuted for "terrorism," prosecutors announced on May 2. A court in Mombasa, Kenya's second city, is due to rule on Wednesday on whether to extend his detention for 90 days.