Paul Mackenzie, a Kenyan cult leader, has been found guilty of murdering 190 children and one adult in Shakahola forest near the coast. The victims died from starvation after Mackenzie ordered members of his doomsday cult to starve themselves and their children to death, claiming this would allow them to “meet Jesus.” Twenty-eight other cult leaders were also convicted of murder in connection with the deaths.
Dan Mackenzie, the 27-year-old eldest son of the convicted cult leader, disclosed that his five younger siblings were subjected to forced fasting as recently as two weeks before the trial. He reported the case to police, who rescued eight children including his siblings from their grandmother’s house and transferred them to a rescue centre. Dan described the conditions, stating that the children were being denied food for extended periods. He noted that as a child himself, he experienced abuse within the cult, including being forced to fast for nearly a week at age 12 and being beaten by church members for hours.
Dan, who initially defended his father, came to understand the full scope of the tragedy during the court proceedings. He eventually reported family members still adhering to the cult’s teachings in order to protect his siblings, including reporting his grandmother to authorities. He expressed regret about his own education, having been forced to leave school at age seven due to the cult’s prohibition on formal education. The cult also rejected modern medicine as “evil.”
Now living in Malindi as a motorcycle taxi driver, Dan supports himself and his younger siblings. He acknowledged that community reaction to him has been mixed, with some residents angry about his father’s crimes while others have accepted him because he has distanced himself from the cult’s ideology. Justice Diana Mochache delivered an eight-hour judgment in Mombasa, noting that Mackenzie’s followers regarded him as “Jesus’s mouthpiece.” The judge noted that burials in the forest were referred to as “weddings,” with deceased members celebrated as having “wedded with Jesus.”
Mackenzie was arrested in 2023 after more than 400 bodies were discovered in shallow graves in Shakahola forest. He faces additional separate cases involving terrorism charges, radicalisation, and denying children an education. He is scheduled to be sentenced on 6 November. Stephen Mwiti, a man who lost all six of his children to the cult, welcomed the verdict outside court.
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