Family holds requiem mass for Nakuru doctor, murdered children

Nakuru doctor James Gakara two children Dylan and Hailey funeral

Caskets containing  the remains of Nakuru-based doctor James Gakara and his two children, Dylan and Hailey, during a memorial service at Holy Trinity Milimani Catholic Church in Nakuru town on September 27, 2021.

Photo credit: Cheboite Kigen | Nation Media Group

The family of late Nakuru doctor James Gakara held a memorial service for him and his late children on Monday. 

The relatives, who are still struggling to come to terms with the painful loss of the medic and his two children, gathered at the Holy Trinity Milimani Catholic Church in Nakuru Town. 

Nakuru doctor James Gakara two children Dylan and Hailey funeral

Relatives of Nakuru-based doctor James Gakara and his two children, Dylan and Hailey, during a memorial service at Holy Trinity Milimani Catholic Church in Nakuru town on September 27, 2021.

Photo credit: Cheboite Kigen | Nation Media Group

A sombre mood enveloped the church as the caskets of the three lay side by side. 

Nakuru doctor James Gakara two children Dylan and Hailey funeral

The caskets containing the remains of Nakuru-based doctor James Gakara at Holy Trinity Milimani Catholic Church in Nakuru town on September 27, 2021.

Photo credit: Cheboite Kigen | Nation Media Group
Nakuru doctor James Gakara two children Dylan and Hailey funeral

The casket containing the remains of Karuana, the daughter of Nakuru-based doctor James Gakara at Holy Trinity Milimani Catholic Church in Nakuru town on September 27, 2021.

Photo credit: Cheboite Kigen | Nation Media Group
Nakuru doctor James Gakara two children Dylan and Hailey funeral

The casket containing the remains of Dylan, the son of Nakuru-based doctor James Gakara at Holy Trinity Milimani Catholic Church in Nakuru town on September 27, 2021.

Photo credit: Cheboite Kigen | Nation Media Group

Ms Winnie Odhiambo, Dr Gakara's widow and mother of Dylan and Hailey, was 

Nakuru doctor James Gakara wife winnie two children Dylan and Hailey funeral

Ms Winnie Odhiambo, the widow of Dr James Gakara, during the memorial service of her husband and two children at Holy Trinity Milimani Catholic Church in Nakuru town on September 27, 2021.

Photo credit: Cheboite Kigen | Nation Media Group

Family spokesperson Burton Njoroge yesterday told the Nation that Ms Odhiambo was doing well following her admission to hospital moments after her husband's death.

The family said she relapsed into the shock she had suffered on receiving the news of her children’s death on learning that her husband, from whom she had hoped to get answers to her many unanswered questions, had also breathed his last.

Main suspect

Dr Gakara, the main suspect in the murder of his five-year-old son Dylan and three-year-old daughter Karuana, died last week while receiving treatment at Nakuru Level Five Hospital.

He had been found unconscious in his bed in a separate room from where the bodies of his children were found on September 18.

Karuana Gakara and Dylan Gakara

Karuana Gakara, 3, and Dylan Gakara, 5, the two children suspected to have been murdered by their father, Dr James Gakara.

Photo credit: Pool

In the house, police found assorted drugs that the doctor is suspected to have injected his children and himself with.

A post-mortem on the bodies of the two minors, conducted last Sunday at the Nakuru County morgue, was inconclusive and detectives collected samples for further analysis.

The exam on Dr Gakara’s body, done on Friday, revealed that he died as a result of ingesting an unknown substance.

Dr Titus Ngulungu, the government pathologist who conducted the autopsy at the Nakuru Level Five Hospital mortuary, reported traces of drugs in the body and the presence of injection marks on one of the arms.

"As a result of my examination, I have formed the opinion that the cause of death was a foreign substance suspected to be medicine,” Dr Ngulungu said, noting, however, that the type of substance was not immediately clear.

“For now, we cannot establish if the medicine in his body was administered by him or by a doctor. We have taken organ and tissue samples to the Government Chemist, where they will be analysed to establish if there was something else and if it was poisonous.”

The post-mortem was conducted in the presence of representatives from the doctor’s and his wife’s families.

Meanwhile, the family says burial arrangements are almost complete, ahead of the send-off, scheduled for tomorrow.

A requiem mass will be held at the Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Milimani today, ahead of the burial at their Mbaruk home in Gilgil.

Additional reporting by Mercy Koskey