Teachers from Busia and Siaya counties have told the Mombasa High Court that several pupils and students failed to return to school in the second term of 2025 after travelling with their parents to Kwa Binzaro in Kilifi County, where 28 bodies were exhumed from shallow graves.
The evidence emerged during the murder trial of preacher Paul Nthenge Mackenzie and seven co-accused over the alleged killings at Kwa Binzaro, about four kilometres from Shakahola.
Testifying before Lady Justice Wendy Kagendo on Wednesday, Dishon Shihundu, the senior principal of St Peter’s Budokomi Secondary School in Busia, said Form Two student Jael Atieno Ochieng went missing from school on March 19, 2025.
Shihundu said he repeatedly tried to contact her parents without success before sending students from her neighbourhood to establish her whereabouts.
He was informed that Jael had left home with her parents two days earlier.
In August 2025, he learnt from Jael’s brother that she had travelled with her parents to Kwa Binzaro and was feared dead.
The principal told the court that DNA analysis had identified one of the bodies exhumed from the site as Jael’s father, whose remains were released to the family for burial.
Salma Olayo Anyitu, a senior teacher at Goro Primary School in Siaya County, told the court that three pupils, Florence Akinyi, Christine Achieng and Mary Atieno, did not return for the second term.
Anyitu said she regularly interacted with the learners, particularly Mary, a Grade Six pupil who excelled in ball games.
The court heard that the three pupils travelled to Kwa Binzaro with their parents and three siblings on March 30, 2025, for fasting.
Three bodies exhumed from the site have since been identified through DNA analysis as those of Mary Atieno, Florence Akinyi and Shadrack Ochieng, one of the siblings.
Jackline Awiti Akinyi, manager of Kamalumbe Early Childhood Development Education centre in Siaya, also confirmed that Shadrack and Esther Achieng were pupils at the institution.
The hearing comes a week after Mackenzie and 28 co-accused were convicted in the Shakahola massacre case over the murder of 191 people, including 190 children.
The prosecution is expected to call more witnesses in the Kwa Binzaro trial.