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No, lead investigator in Kenya’s Echesa arms deal case not murdered

Kenya’s former sports minister Rashid Echesa was arrested by detectives from the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) on 13 February 2020. Days later, he was reportedly charged with forgery in a case involving an alleged KSh39 billion fraudulent arms deal.

On 18 February a Facebook user posted: “DCI Officer in Echesa's Case Killed and Dumped In Kikuyu.” The post shows a photo of a crowd of people standing near a body covered in a blue cloth.

It has a shortened link to an article on the Daily Statesman website, also dated 18 February.

“Roman Musyoki who is said to have been the main investigator on Rashid Echesa’s case has been found dead and dumped in Kikuyu along Waiyaki way,” the article says. It includes the photo of people near a body covered in a blue cloth.



How true is this story? We checked.

Photo taken in Zimbabwe in 2018


Echesa’s case has been widely reported in the media. But there have been no credible reports of the case’s lead DCI detective being murdered.

And the Daily Statesman article throws up the red flags of a false news report. It provides no sources for its information and is full of grammatical errors – particularly in its account of how “Musyoki” was supposedly murdered.

A Google reverse image search reveals that the photo first appeared online in an article published in 2018.

The article, on the Nehanda Radio website, reports on the death of a young woman who was raped, murdered and her body left in a maize field in Gweru, Zimbabwe. – Grace Gichuhi




 

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