Julius Mwoki 25, has not stopped expressing his gratitude to God and his small bag – for saving his life on the fateful night of August 8.
Mwoki was supposed to be in the company of his four cousins; Victor Mwangi (25) and Fredrick Mureithi (30) and their friends Michael Onduso (29) and Nicholus Musa (28) who were brutally murdered by irate villagers in Kitengela.
The lover of bikes was to join the four for the trip to Kitengela, but delayed a bit as he had forgotten his backpack at home – and had to ride back to pick.
This is what saved Mwoki – that little act of forgetfulness.
It probably would have been a different story had he accompanied his cousins to Kitengela.
“I just can’t believe it. If it was not that I went back for my backpack at home, I could also have been killed together with my friends,” Mwoki told the Standard.
The phones went unanswered
Adding: “I tried calling their mobile phones after picking my bag but they went unanswered. I was shocked to later learn that they had all been killed.”
The four young men were lynched by a mob after being accused of stealing livestock in the Emkamuriaki village, Kajiado County.
Meanwhile, detectives from the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) arrested a Mr Benson Melonyie ole Mungai at his hideout in Kitengela town on Monday evening, August 16.
He is alleged to have masterminded the killings. Mungai’s arrest comes a few days after DCI took over investigations into the murders and moved with speed to pursue the killers.
Ole Mungai was positively linked to the brutal killings after forensic investigations placed him at the scene of the crime, where it was established that he led and coordinated the killing of the four.