Serial rapist on the prowl; the harrowing tales of Nyakach
Women and girls in Nyakach area of Kisumu County are living in fear of serial rapists who only strike in the middle of the night.
What you need to know:
- Women in villages in North Nyakach Ward, in the expansive lower Nyakach area spend nights of terror fearing when the next rapist will attack.
- The three girls were defiled while sleeping in their deceased grandmother’s house; a widow and her younger sister too, were defiled a while later.
- Police have not been able to arrest perpetrators.
Along the Kisumu- Kericho highway is the new Ahero- Kisii Road. The once narrow highway riddled with potholes and prone to accidents has acquired a new layer of tarmac. As you drive along, you notice shrubs and homes on either side of the road.
In your moment of awe at this new infrastructure, you soon meet picturesque rice plain fields that go beyond the eye view. You then get to the border of Nyando and Nyakach sub-counties of Kisumu near Rae Girls Secondary School. This is where we arguably have the best sunset this side of the world.
Unknown to many though, the descending sun ushers in a night of terror for villages in North Nyakach Ward, in the expansive lower Nyakach area.
February 1, 2021 will forever be etched in Peris Anyango’s* memory. On the fateful night, the 14-year-old from Gem Rae Sub-location needed to attend to a call of nature. As she ventured out at 1am, she met a seemingly lone assailant at the door. He cast a bright spotlight torch on her face and her attempt to run back and lock the door were futile. He grabbed her and dragged her into the house.
Anyango’s 17-year-old sister, Dorcas Awino* sadly narrates the horrendous occurrence. The sudden movements startled her into waking up, she says. Her involuntary scream was met with a harsh warning by the knife-wielding man, warning her not to make any sound.
The three girls, including another sibling, 16-year-old Class Eight pupil Gaudensia Aoko*, slept in their deceased grandmother’s house. They all went mute.
Beastly man
“The attacker asked us questions including when our grandmother died. All this time he wielded a knife and ordered us to cover our faces before forcing himself on my sister Aoko, then me, and eventually our youngest sister Anyango,” narrates Awino, a Form One student.
She says the man would leisurely take a break in between, then proceed to defile her repeatedly. The ordeal took hours before the beastly man left at around 4am, with a stern warning to the girls not to make any sound.
The girls’ parents heard no sound during the entire incident since they slept in the main house about 100 metres away. This is a common setting in Luo traditional homes where parents sleep in the main house while the children occupy the jikon (detached kitchen) or the grandparents’ home.
The girls’ father Benson Ouma* says he only learnt of the incident when the daughters ran towards the main house at dawn screaming.
“I rushed them to Katito dispensary on my motorbike. There were no medics at the facility, so we moved to a private one. Upon assessment and treatment we had to again wait till daybreak for doctors at the public facility to do an assessment as ordered by the police,” Mr Ouma says.
He confirms that after interrogating the girls, the police concluded that they could identify the perpetrator. He, however, laments that despite this, no arrest has been made.
About two months later, the suspected serial rapist with several cases in between, would strike again in Atotiengo Location. This time the victims are a 31-year-old widow Victoria Akinyi* and her younger sister 17-year-old Marlin Adhiambo*.
Younger sibling
Ms Akinyi says the man forcefully entered the house through a window, frightening her and her sister from sleep in an adjacent room. This ordeal lasted an hour.
“My sister made an honest mistake of calling out my name after my attempts not to startle her despite this man being on me all this time,” Akinyi says. This action made him rape the younger sibling too.
“He would go on to mock me, asking why I would plead with him not to defile my younger sister, claiming she is an adult,” Ms Akinyi narrates.
With his knife, the assailant threatened Akinyi whom he had ordered to lie on the bed and face the wall as he defiled the Form Two student.
In an almost similar way, he issued a stern warning to the two not to make any noise as he escaped.
“When we finally gained courage to raise an alarm attracting villagers, he was long gone, with frantic searches thereafter proving futile,” she says.
Akinyi reported the matter at Katito Police Station the next morning.
“The officers at the station taunted us about the many similar cases reported and seemed amused that we were just among the statistics,” she narrates.
The widow says attempts to get follow up for a medical report at Katito dispensary proved futile.
“A friend facilitated our treatment and assessment at Jaramogi Oginga Odinga Teaching and Referral Facility in Kisumu,” she says.
Ms Akinyi has makes a trip to the facility’s GBV centre every two weeks for check-up, something she notes is financially draining.
The police have not nabbed the perpetrator due to lack of coordination between the investigating officer and the hospital that attended to the women, which is about 40kms away.
Nyakach area has had a number of suspected coordinated cases of rape and defilements.
Onyango Victone, a director at Inuka Success Organisation that works in the locality, says they have picked similarities in the attacks following survivors’ documentation.
Coordinated attack
“Going by the careless questions he asks survivors before he attacks, this is a person known to them. That he carries a similar weapon and spotlight torch is a pointer to a coordinated attack,” notes Mr Onyango.
He adds that the ‘team’ has mapped out homes where women are alone or widowed.
“It is clear this is not a one-man show. It is coordinated attacks; serial rapists are on the prowl,” he says.
Inuka Success, a member of the sexual gender-based violence alliance in Kisumu County has partnered with Kisumu Medical and Education Trust (KMET) to undertake community sensitisation and dialogues to ensure all cases are reported to the police.
“There is need for a status update of this cases and arrest of suspects. The police seem reluctant to follow up the cases, which then denies the survivors justice,” says Mr Onyango.
Agoro West Location Chief Elizabeth Atieno says given the status of Katito, a fast-rising market in the locality and its recent upgraded status, the town has attracted people from far and wide including criminal elements
“I, however, don’t want to apportion blame. I admit there is a weak link in the justice system; 98 per cent of cases in my jurisdiction have been reported with no action. The laxity in the system has to be looked into,” she says in an apparent reference to the police service.
KMET, Advocacy and Policy Lead, Patricia Nudi says through the gender justice project, in collaboration with Equality Now – they note that the defilement and rape cases in the peri-urban centres of Kisumu are systemic and coordinated.
“We seek to follow up these cases to ensure justice is realised. So far, none has got justice yet at least six cases have been reported at the police station,” Ms Nudi says.
She acknowledges the weak link in the justice system mostly around investigative services, with the program committing to take police officers through capacity-building training.
“We see a scenario where they (police) would want to do the right thing but lack capacity and training. We call on their bosses to ensure contact capacity training and vigilance to arrest the dire situation,” she says.
Safe house
Through community conversations the local MP has pledged to provide gender desks at police stations and construction of a safe house for survivors, Ms Nudi says.
John Paul Murunga, a program officer at Equality Now, however, says the State has failed in its obligations to protect and avert any form of sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV).
Mr Murunga an advocate of the High Court of Kenya, says the Nyakach cases reveal lapses in the State’s obligation to provide adequate security for SGBV survivors.
He adds that continued training of officers without forensic laboratories to support and identify evidence is futile, noting that the cases will still fall through the justice system. This gap, he says, frustrates investigating officers to the point of dropping cases much to the detriment of the survivors.
We have avoided using the real names to protect the survivors
