Woman Found Dead In Catholic Church Pit Latrine

A young woman was discovered dead in a latrine inside a Catholic church in Kenya, but the circumstances of her death are unknown.

Josephine Karimi, a 24-year-old Kenyan woman who had recently begun working as a secretary for a Catholic Church group, went missing on June 28.

Her body was discovered in a pit latrine on the church grounds on Monday, July 3 after a comprehensive investigation by the police.

The 24-year-old woman had just been working at the St. Mary’s Catholic Women Association (CWA) Centre in Kiaragana, Embu County, for seven days when she was brutally murdered and her body was buried there five days later.

According to various Kenyan sources, her family, as well as the entire Kivwe village in Kenya where she was raised, are in grief.

Karimi’s family attempted to reach her on Thursday last week after she did not return home on Wednesday, June 28, but her phone had been switched off.

They received information from a Catholic priest moments later, who informed them that Karimi was not at the center and that no one knew where she was.

“Before Karimi went missing, she had lunch with her mother and went back to work on Wednesday,” her father, Simon Kivuti Gatumu, said.

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“But the next day we called to check on her, but her phone did not go through, and we sensed that something was wrong. Then a priest called and told us that Kirimi hadn’t come to work on Thursday. I rushed to the centre and found that my daughter was indeed not in her office, which was locked.”

The family was shocked and looked everywhere for their daughter, but they were unable to locate her.

Her family posted about her missing on social media and in a number of churches, but nobody had any idea where she may be.

Her father, Mr. Gatumo, a worker at the Embu branch of the Kenya National Library Services, reported the incident to the Runyenjes Police Station on Saturday and gave a statement.

Detectives at the station instructed Mr. Gatumo to leave and assured him they would look into the matter.

When the detectives returned to Runyenjes Police Station on Monday, they asked the librarian to accompany them to the Catholic Centre, and he consented. They picked up a casual laborer who also works for the church and grilled him for hours after they arrived.

During the interrogation, the laborer, whose duty it is at the center to clean bushes and do other menial tasks, confessed that he knew where Karimi was and that she was secure.

“The casual labourer told the detectives that Karimi was fine, but unfortunately she was not,” Mr Gatumo recalled.

The investigators were led by the laborer to the pit toilet, where they discovered the woman’s lifeless body and took him back to the station for more questioning.

Anthony Maina, the head of the Embu East sub-county police, said the laborer was being viewed as a key suspect in the grisly murder and would face charges in court after investigations were finished.

“The suspect works within the premises of the centre, and he must face the law,” he said, adding that the killing was being treated as murder.

“We have established that the woman was eliminated and thrown there, possibly to cover up the evidence.”

He stated that the deceased’s body had been recovered and transported to the mortuary for post-mortem examination, and he requested the family to be patient, promising that justice will be served.

Mr Gatumo bemoaned the fact that his daughter was working alone in a remote location with no security.

“My daughter was working alone in that office, and there were no guards to watch over her. If there were guards at the centre or more people working there, my daughter would not have been murdered. We are still coming to terms with our daughter’s death,” he said.

Father Amedeus Mugendi, a Catholic priest, opted not to address the issue.

“The matter is sensitive, and I don’t want to talk about it because it is being handled by the police,” the priest said.