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A Kenyan court on Friday handed Paul Mackenzie, a controversial cult leader, a combined 200-year prison sentence for the deaths of 191 people, among them 190 children, in a religious fasting tragedy that shook the East African country.
“The sentences will run consecutively, making an aggregate sentence of 200 years imprisonment for convict Mackenzie,” Justice Diana Kavedza Mochache said while delivering the sentence at the High Court in the coastal city of Mombasa.
Mackenzie, a former preacher who led the Good News International Church, received a 100-year prison term for the deaths of 190 children and another 100 years for the death of an adult.
The sentencing followed his conviction on 191 counts of murder in connection with deaths linked to extreme fasting in Shakahola forest in southeastern Kenya.
Prosecutors accused Mackenzie of manipulating his followers into abandoning food and starving themselves and their children in the belief that fasting would bring them closer to Jesus Christ.
The case drew international attention after authorities began exhuming bodies from shallow graves in the remote forest in April 2023.
Investigators discovered that many of the victims were children, prompting widespread outrage and questions about how the deaths had gone undetected for so long.
The tragedy triggered investigations into religious extremism, the regulation of religious organizations, and the failure of authorities to intervene despite earlier warnings about Mackenzie’s activities.
The case remains one of Kenya’s deadliest cult-related tragedies.
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