A Kenyan court has sentenced Paul Mackenzie, leader of a doomsday cult, to 200 years in prison for his role in the deaths of 191 people, all but one of them children, in one of the country’s deadliest cases of religious extremism.
Mackenzie was convicted alongside 28 other defendants for directing members of his Good News International Ministries cult to starve their children and themselves to death in the belief that they would meet Jesus.
Doomsday Cult leader Mackenzie criminally responsible
Justice Diana Mochache, who delivered the sentence, said Mackenzie bore the primary criminal responsibility for ordering his followers to undertake the deadly fast.
She described the killings as cold and calculated, saying the sentence was necessary to send a strong message that such atrocities deserved the maximum penalties permitted by law.
The court handed Mackenzie 100 years in prison for homicide and another 100 years for offences relating to starvation. While sentences within each category will run concurrently, the two sets will run consecutively, bringing his total sentence to 200 years.
Mackenzie’s co-defendants, including guards who enforced the fasting orders and gravediggers who helped conceal victims’ bodies, received varying prison terms of up to 160 years.
The judge declined to impose the death penalty, which prosecutors had sought, despite finding that the case met the threshold for its consideration.
She said capital punishment would remove any possibility of rehabilitation and disengagement. Kenya has not carried out an execution since 1987.
Mackenzie and the other defendants had pleaded not guilty before their conviction on October 19, insisting that nobody had been forced to die.
The case came to public attention in 2023 after authorities discovered hundreds of bodies buried in shallow graves in Shakahola Forest, near the Kenyan coastal town of Malindi.
Mackenzie was arrested following the discovery, which triggered a massive investigation and shocked the country. More than 400 bodies have since been exhumed from the forest.
Investigations found that most victims died from starvation, while others suffered suffocation, strangulation or head injuries. Some bodies were too decomposed for their causes of death to be established.
During her judgment, Justice Mochache said Mackenzie’s followers regarded him as the mouthpiece of Jesus and were taught to obey his instructions.
She also found that those who resisted his teachings were beaten to death, while burials in the forest were referred to as weddings, with the dead celebrated as having married Jesus.
The cult leader had established Good News International Ministries in 2003, building a following through church branches and a television station that broadcast his sermons.
His teachings included describing formal education as evil, healthcare as contrary to religious doctrine and digital identity cards as the mark of the devil.
After the main church shut down in 2019, Mackenzie moved to Shakahola Forest and encouraged his followers to join him.
The killings have raised questions about the failure of authorities to intervene despite earlier warnings about the cult’s activities.
A state-funded investigation by the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights found that local administrators and law enforcement officials had repeatedly ignored the group’s activities.
One relative of the victims, Francis Wanje, who lost eight family members, including two grandchildren, said he had reported the case to police in March 2023 but was disappointed that immediate action was not taken to rescue others.
The conviction covers 191 victims, although more than 400 bodies were recovered from the forest. Mackenzie also faces separate manslaughter and terrorism charges, which he denies.
Kehinde Ayanboade
Kehinde Ayanboade is the Managing Editor and Publisher of Naija Metro News, with over eight years of experience covering Nigerian politics, crime, legislative proceedings and metropolitan affairs.
