New details have emerged on the killing of a head teacher who was lured to a home in Egesieri after responding to what he believed was a “genuine” phone call only to end up begging for his life and later being found mutilated.
Ezekiel Nkeere Gitangwa, 47, the head teacher of Getengereirie Primary School, was found inside the house where he had been taken.
According to accounts gathered during investigations, he was heard pleading asking for forgiveness as attackers beat him and subjected him to severe violence.
Neighbours reported hearing prolonged screaming and the sound of a man being beaten, before the noise stopped.
After that, witnesses say silence followed, and the attackers’ plans appeared to include disposing of his body.
Gitangwa had left his Nyabite home that morning after telling his wife, Gladys Bonareri Achoki, that he was going to serve as MC for a relative’s wedding. A boda-boda rider dropped him at Egesieri around 9 a.m., after which he walked directly to the home of Agneta Agwata, a nurse at Nyamaiya Health Centre.
Police records indicate Agneta had contacted him by phone, and that her claims—whether about land, money, or other “unfinished business”—were enough to persuade him to walk to the residence. Witnesses say the story she used worked, and he arrived alive.
Investigators later established that Agneta was not alone when the violence occurred. Her boyfriend, NYS officer Zablon Gekara, was in the house, and other men had reportedly been seen coming and going for months.
However, on the day of the killing, it was Gekara and Agneta who remained central to the investigation, especially because Agneta had allegedly suffered losses connected to a past marriage: her husband, a Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) member, had died.
Two days after the incident, on 1 January 2023, police broke down the door. Agneta had disappeared by then. Inside a poultry room, officers found Gitangwa’s body.
The reports say he had been covered with a purple carpet, and that both hands and both legs were chopped off, with the severed limbs left beside his torso.
Plastic bags and gunny sacks were stacked near him, suggesting the attackers had begun packing his body for dumping but failed to complete the task.
The post-mortem later confirmed the immediate cause of death: Gitangwa bled to death from deep cuts to the back of his head and neck, leading to haemorrhagic shock.
Investigators concluded that the mutilation occurred after he was already fatally injured.
Money also moved almost immediately after the killing.
Police say Gitangwa’s phone was used to withdraw cash through intermediaries, including a boda-boda rider who withdrew about KSh4,000 and returned most of it, and an M-Pesa agent who did the same. Those two were arrested.
But Agneta and Zablon were not, and no public record shows either being arrested, charged, or convicted.
Detectives further established that Gitangwa had taken a 2.8 million shilling loan from a teachers’ Sacco only days earlier, and that he also owed Agneta roughly three million shillings.
Investigators indicated there had been talk about a land purchase tied to money Agneta had received after her late KDF husband’s death.
Police allege Gitangwa took the cash and diverted part of it to pay for his children’s school fees instead, leaving the land deal unresolved.
Investigators say those debts and the wider personal ties between Agneta and the man formed the core of the case. Agneta allegedly switched off her phones and went into hiding.
Police tracked her movement for weeks, including signals suggesting she planned to cross into Tanzania before heading further, but by mid-January 2023, the trail went cold. Zablon also disappeared.