Details have emerged about the woman who died on Sunday morning after she fell from the sixth floor of an apartment in Kileleshwa, Nairobi.
Police investigations show that the woman, a university student, was in the company of a man (now in police custody) who she had met on a popular dating website. It was also their first meeting, it has emerged.
Consolata Githinji, the 22-year-old student at Murang’a University College, and the man she took a quick liking to quickly exchanged phone numbers after linking up through the website. Soon enough, the two would exchange sweet nothings almost daily.
Last Saturday, the long wait for a physical meetup ended as Consolata made an 85-kilometre trip to Nairobi.
But unlike those who, before Consolata had found love on the same dating site, this rendezvous would define the last moments of Consolata’s life.
Consolata fell from the sixth floor of a building and landed on a balcony on the third floor. The fall killed her instantly. The room she fell out of was a short-term rental apartment.
An all too familiar script, with several femicide cases in the last few years, starting with a night out, and then death in a short-term rental apartment.
According to police investigating the matter, the apartment was found in disarray, leading to the theory of a possible homicide.
However, security guards and staff have told the police that they did not hear any commotion from the room until the woman’s body was found lying in a pool of blood.
Consolata has joined a growing list of more than 500 women who have either been killed or died under mysterious circumstances while in the company of their intimate partners, in the last eight years alone. That dark trend saw President William Ruto form a taskforce to look into the possible ways of ending femicide cases in Kenya.
On Monday afternoon, the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) officers presented Consolata’s partner at the Kibera Law Courts, seeking time to keep him in custody pending the conclusion of their probe.
That probe is intended to determine whether Consolata’s death was an accident or a homicide. The investigation is still in the early stages.
However, one of the investigators on the case told the Nation that Consolata lived and studied in Murang’a, hence the rendezvous was her purpose for visiting Nairobi. Her entire nuclear family, which she still depended on, is also based in Murang’a, the investigator added.
The only person of interest, the man with whom she spent Saturday night, is a 33-year-old salesperson working for a company that distributes women’s hair products.
The man had presented his identification documents when checking into the apartment with Consolata. Police intend to keep him in custody for questioning, if granted permission by the courts.
Investigators have at the same time summoned the caretaker of the short-stay apartment where the incident happened.
Also lined up for questioning are two staff members who were on duty when the incident happened, Nairobi region DCI boss Daniel Kandie said on Monday.
But as investigators question various individuals, Consolata’s body lies cold at the Nairobi Funeral Home, adding to a worrying statistic that some civil society groups have demanded be declared a national crisis.
A police report on the incident stated that at around 5 am on Sunday, police were informed that an unidentified woman had fallen from the 6th floor of Block C and landed on the 3rd floor, sustaining life-threatening injuries.
Officers who responded to the distress call found the woman unconscious. Crime Scene investigators established that the woman had visible injuries on the head, ribs, and hands.
One of the working theories detectives have is that the two lovers had a spat in the apartment, which may have escalated to murder.
