A 13-year-old boy has told the Garissa High Court how his uncle allegedly sexually assaulted and strangled his 17-year-old sister to death.
Giving chilling testimony, the minor described witnessing the incident while pretending to sleep. The accused, Shafa Bilal Shaklane, a community health volunteer, has denied the charges and was released on a Sh1 million bond.
During examination by the Principal Prosecution Counsel Bernard Owuor, the boy said the tragedy happened a few hours after he and his sister returned home from visiting another paternal uncle.
He told the court that after arriving home, they spread mattresses on the verandah where his sister lay down while playing with a phone that was charging, before later moving inside to sleep.
The witness said the accused, their father’s younger brother, arrived later and slept on his mattress, while the deceased lay next to them.
The boy testified that in the middle of the night he was awakened by unusual commotion and realised his sister was struggling as the accused allegedly touched her breasts.
He said he “pretended to be asleep as I watched the events unfold in full glare of the solar lighting system inside the house.”
The witness said his sister kicked the wall as she struggled, but the accused covered her mouth and strangled her until she stopped breathing.
When he attempted to flee, the accused allegedly threatened to kill him, forcing him to continue pretending to sleep.
According to the testimony, after the girl died, the accused allegedly undressed both himself and the deceased and defiled her. “He then went outside to wash his face before returning to the house and repeating the act twice,” the boy said.
He further told the court that the accused later dressed both himself and the deceased, placed her body on the mattress and lay next to it, before threatening to kill him if he revealed what had happened.
At dawn, the accused allegedly woke the minor and took him to the mosque for morning prayers. After the prayers, he sent the boy to call their aunt, Arabel Bilal, who screamed upon seeing the body, attracting neighbours to the homestead.
Members of the public noticed marks and bloodstains on the deceased’s neck and questioned what had happened. The accused allegedly told the crowd that the girl had developed pimples after being treated for dengue fever.
Some members of the public alerted police but the accused fled the scene by the time officers arrived, raising curious suspicion.
Police removed the body for postmortem examination to establish the cause of death, while the minor was taken into custody for protection.
The accused was granted a bond of Sh1 million with a surety of a similar amount. Further hearings are scheduled for February 18, 2026, as the prosecution prepares to call additional witnesses, including the 13-year-old boy who provided the chilling eyewitness account.
