The late Samwel Owuoyo from Ndhiwa in Homa Bay county whose body was found dumped at a homestead Kwa Binzaro village on July 9, 2025.
Detectives will widen their search for suspected graves in Binzaro area in Kilifi County beyond the initial five-acre target area after human remains were discovered outside the mapped zone on Monday.
Kilifi County Investigations Officer Robert Kiinge said the remains — including a skull, jaw, several bones and digits — were found scattered rather than buried.
Mr Kiinge said exhumation will start on Thursday.
“The presence of remains beyond our target area calls for broader surveillance of the expansive forest,” he said, adding that the body parts could have been dispersed by wild animals or people.
Investigators have sampled and marked the remains for further analysis and are working to establish whether they belong to one person. Mapping teams are being assembled to determine the extent of the search area.
Within the original five acres, detectives have so far identified four confirmed graves and three other sites with the “classical presentation” of burial spots.
At the same time, the wife of a man whose body was discovered in a suspected cult compound in Binzaro has revealed that he was a follower of preacher Paul Mackenzie, the prime suspect in the Shakahola cult.
More than 400 followers of the preacher are believe to have died under unclear circumstances.
Police who raided the homestead two weeks ago said Samwel Owuoyo's body was found with his legs tied with a rope.
Ms Caroline Oyuga, the widow, said she had warned her husband against following the teachings of Mackenzie of the Good News International Ministry which were being aired on TV.
The late Samwel Owuoyo from Ndhiwa in Homa Bay county whose body was found dumped at a homestead Kwa Binzaro village on July 9, 2025.
She said they were a prayerful couple at their church in Busia but her husband later stopped attending church under the influence of the televangelist's teachings.
“We used to pray together in our church, and my husband was also a technician there, but he suddenly changed after he started watching Pastor Mackenzie. He would sit in the house watching Mackenzie’s channel on TV or his phone. After the government shut down the TV channel, he continued following Mackenzie's teachings on YouTube,” the widow said.
Mackenzie, through his lawyer Lawrence Obonyo, has distanced himself from the Binzaro incidents after it emerged that detectives are probing his links to a suspected cult in the five acre homestead. The homestead is within Chakama location where Shakahola area is also situated.
According to Mr Obonyo, his client, who has been in custody since 2023, is usually only visited by his close relatives and lawyers.
Owuoyo was reported missing in Busia early July. He had left home with two of his sons, leaving behind four children with his wife.
Deeply indoctrinated
Six other children who were at the Binzaro homestead with their parents, who are now in custody, are also feared dead.
Ms Oyuga said that she was against her husband’s decision to stop going to church, which created a rift between them. She said she never imagined that her husband would become so deeply indoctrinated.
The widow said before her late husband left home, he changed significantly and was no longer the loving husband she had known for years.
A police officer mans a homestead in Binzaro area in Chakama Ranch where a body of a middle-age man was found.
“My husband had changed. He was hopeless and moody, always angry at me, now that we were not of one faith. We used to differ a lot,” she added.
She said her insistence that their children continue going to school made her husband resent her even more.
“He did not want our children to go to school, but I made sure I took them every morning before I went to hawk clothes. I was optimistic that he would one day drop his new-found faith and return to his normal life and to the church,” she said.
Ms Oyuga also said the deceased later began deceiving her. He would take the two children he loved most and then return with them, so she was not alarmed when he left with them.
“He was very close to the two children and loved them more than the others,” she said.
Ms Oyuga said Owuoyo left their home in Busia on June 28. He then switched off his phone, and all her efforts to trace him, even with the help of a Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) officer, were unsuccessful.
Police officers secure the Binzaro homestead in Chakama Ranch where the body of a middle-aged man was found. Authorities say at least 11 people are being investigated in what appears like the Shakahola cult.
At some point, she thought that her husband had gone to their ancestral home in Ndhiwa, Homa Bay County.
“I asked our neighbour in Ndhiwa to find out if my husband had arrived safely, but he wasn’t there,” she said.
She was later advised by friends to inquire at Busia market, where he operated a small workshop. There, some people told her that her husband had boarded a bus heading to the Coast region with the children.
They further revealed that two men had approached her husband before his travel, and although they overheard them urging him to "decide once", they could not understand the full context of the conversation.
Ms Oyuga mourned the loss of her husband, saying she wishes to travel to search for her missing children but lacks the money to do so.
“A detective called to inform me that his strangled body was found in the forest, but my children are still missing. I wish I could go and search for them, but I do not have money. I am stuck. I do not know what to do,” she said tearfully.
Ms Mary Achieng', who is Owuoyo's sister-in-law, said he was a God-fearing man who wouldn’t ordinarily be swayed by false teachings. The unfolding events have left them shocked.
“We are vulnerable, hustling every day to get food. We are unable to raise money to travel and don’t know how the body will reach here. We cannot tell how he was lured to join the suspected cult to the point of dying,” she lamented.
She urged the government to act firmly against cults that are endangering the lives of innocent people.
