KNH admits it cant explain mysterious murder

The management of the Kenyatta National Hospital was on Monday at a loss to explain how unknown assailants gained access to the facility on Sunday morning and murdered a 42-year-old cancer patient.

The hospital chief executive, Lily Koros, said they were still unable to explain how the mystery murderers committed the crime without being detected by either hospital security or the nurses on duty.

“At this moment we also don’t know how this happened but its an isolated case,” she said.

According to the officials the nurse on duty attended to Mutunga at 4am and when she came back at 5:30am to check on him she discovered that he was dead.

The nurse also added that Mutunga’s body had several stab wounds and one of the eyes had been gouged out.

So far, there are more questions than answers as far as the incident is concerned. Ward 8c, which is situated on the 8^th floor of the hospital, has four cubicles, each with two beds.

Mutunga was in the last cube which he was sharing with another patient said to be deaf before two people, a male and a female, attacked him.

KNH Assistant Director Joel Lessan stated that it was not clear how the attackers managed to bypass the three nurses who were supposed to be manning the ward at the time.

Mutunga’s family is now demanding answers over the circumstances that led to his death.

They are also questioning why the hospital authority decided to move the body from the scene of the crime before they got to see it.

“We found the body had been moved and washed,” said a family member.

Ruth Mawei, a niece to the deceased, said nurses and security officers at the Referral Hospital interfered with the body, adding that there is a possibility of cover up in the incident.

Mawei ruled out a family feud as the reason for the murder, saying the patient had no family wrangles back home.

On her part, Koros maintained that the hospital is fully cooperating with police, as investigations continue, to ascertain the death of Matunga.

It also emerged that Kenya’s biggest referral hospital has no closed-circuit television for security surveillance.

So far, police have detained the three nurses who were on duty for questioning.

Additional reporting by Jemimah Gathoni