Kenyan prosecutors have announced new charges against Paul Mackenzie, the leader of the notorious Good News International Church cult, linking him to 52 additional deaths at a separate village following the grim discovery of mass graves last year.
Mackenzie, who was arrested in 2023 after authorities uncovered 429 bodies buried in mass graves in the remote Shakahola forest, has been held in custody since. He faces allegations of orchestrating the deaths by encouraging his followers to starve themselves, reportedly continuing to send instructions from his prison cell through handwritten notes.
The Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions confirmed on Monday that Mackenzie and co-accused individuals would be formally charged over the deaths at the Binzaro homestead in Kilifi County, approximately 30 kilometers from Shakahola along Kenya’s Indian Ocean coast.
Prosecutors state that Mackenzie is “reasonably suspected to have masterminded” these deaths, using radical teachings and organized methods to lure victims to the village. Investigators recovered notes from Mackenzie’s prison cell that allegedly detail communications carried out via mobile phones to coordinate the deadly acts.
The charges against Mackenzie and others include radicalization, facilitation of terrorist acts, and murder. These new accusations add to the initial charges connected to the Shakahola mass graves.
Earlier investigations uncovered around 34 bodies and over 100 body parts at Binzaro, leading to the latest legal action.
This development follows the guilty plea of one of Mackenzie’s co-accused, Enos Amanya Ngala, the former head of security at Shakahola, who admitted responsibility for the deaths of 191 children found in the original graves.
Survivors of the cult describe a chilling hierarchy ordered by Mackenzie, where children were told to starve themselves first, followed by unmarried adults, women, men, and lastly church leaders.
Mackenzie founded the Good News International Church in 2003 but claimed to have closed it in 2019. His teachings condemned formal education as satanic and a means to exploit followers. He was previously arrested in 2017 and 2018 for urging children to skip school, arguing that education was “not recognized in the Bible.”
The tragic case has drawn widespread criticism of Kenyan authorities, with many questioning whether stronger regulation and earlier intervention could have prevented the deaths.
Reporting by Ehud Jones.
