Winfred Opha, who was killed by her boyfriend in Kanyakine, Imenti South, stumbled into her neighbour’s house after being stabbed in the chest, stomach and neck, investigations have revealed.
Residents we spoke to at the scene said after being stabbed, Winfred sought help from her neighbour who assisted in taking her to Kanyakine Level Four Hospital where she was pronounced dead on arrival.
“The neighbour told us that when Winfred entered her house, she was crying and bleeding profusely from the stab wounds,” said a friend of the neighbour. Winfred died before she could be taken to hospital, just a kilometre away.
According to the friend, the neighbour was so traumatised that she fled her house, which still has pools of blood where the victim bled.
When we visited the house where they lived on Tuesday, the doors were locked and the neighbours refused to discuss the incident.
A student at the Kenya Medical Training College, where Winfred was studying a medical record programme, described her as a “quiet” woman who “had no problems with anyone”.
“We were shocked to hear that she was killed. She was a kind and generous lady. I will miss her because the few times we interacted, I found her kind,” the student said of Winfred, who joined the college in March this year.
Reports also indicated that the suspect, who is not a student at the college, had been at the Kanyakine market for about a month.
“No one knew what he did for a living. We heard that he was staying in a separate house with a male friend who has since fled after the incident,” said a resident.
Police are looking for the suspect, with reports suggesting he may be holed up in Nairobi.
After committing the crime on Sunday morning, the man fled immediately.
He switched off his phone, which has since been traced to a location in Nairobi that police will not disclose yet so as not to jeopardise the investigation.
Imenti South Police Commander Abdulrahim Musa said police were spending sleepless nights on the trail of the man who also injured three other students.
He said they were also relying on getting information from one of the victims, who is in hospital.
“When she recovers, we will interrogate her and find out exactly what happened. At the moment, we are not even sure if the dead woman was the suspect’s girlfriend,” Mr Musa said. He added that the other two victims who had been treated and discharged had not provided any concrete information.
Mr Humphrey Mugambi, the acting chief of Kanyakine, said the students had held a party on Saturday night and were partying into Sunday morning when the man stormed into Winfred’s house and attacked them.
Mr Mugambi said Kanyakine market had experienced a spate of violent crime lately due to a shortage of police officers, adding that there were currently no security patrols in the busy shopping centre.
“We have a police station with an armoury, but we have no officers. We are appealing to the government to equip the post because the market has grown due to the large number of students,” he said.
Last month, a 72-year-old woman was raped and killed in the area. A young man suspected of the crime was lynched by the public.
