Peter Kimani was a 73-year-old patriarch, prominent local landholder, and real estate owner residing in Karunga village within the Bahati sub-county of Nakuru County. According to official police investigative records from the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI), Kimani owned substantial and high-value real estate parcels in the rapidly expanding peri-urban areas of Nakuru.
Kimani lived on his primary homestead alongside his wife, Tabitha Mangi, and multiple adult children. While a faction of his household, his wife, a daughter named Rahab Mudoni, and two sons, were having domestic disputes with him, Kimani maintained close ties with his other relatives.
Peter Kimani’s lifestyle was defined by a sharp contrast between his substantial real estate wealth and a highly cautious, stressful domestic existence. Rather than living a lavish public life, his daily routine became increasingly restricted by severe family hostility over his assets.
Kimani used to actively manage his homestead and properties, he prioritized securing and holding onto prime, rapidly appreciating peri-urban land in Nakuru rather than liquidating it for quick cash or distributing it prematurely. His core background of conflict stemmed directly from his refusal to subdivide and distribute his ancestral land and commercial real estate properties in accordance with the demands of his wife and children.
Because he had survived previous attempts on his life, including covert poisoning attempts by his immediate family, Kimani lived under a state of constant vigilance. His fear of being poisoned heavily dictated his eating habits, making him extremely careful about who prepared his meals within his own household.
While he shared a compound with his wife and multiple adult children, Kimani lived in a state of domestic isolation due to constant acrimonious disagreements regarding his estates. He relied heavily on outside relatives, like his daughter Joyce, for genuine welfare checks and support.
Because Kimani firmly refused to give in to these demands, choosing instead to retain single ownership and control over his properties, the domestic dispute escalated into months of severe abuse.
According to statements from local residents, investigators, and his granddaughters, Peter Kimani’s wife and children subjected him to months of severe psychological, domestic, and physical abuse, which included repeatedly trying to sneak poison into his food. Kimani survived these early attempts, forcing him into a state of extreme paranoia regarding anything served to him within his own household. The four family members reportedly colluded and secretly sold off a piece of his valuable land portfolio without his consent.
According to investigation reports, using the proceeds from the sale of Kimani’s land, on Friday, February 13, 2026, the family faction brought in a contracted handsman into the household compound. The man was hosted, fed, and slept inside the main house for two consecutive nights while Mzee Kimani remained unaware of the plot.
In the wee hours of Sunday morning, February 15, 2026, the contracted hitman executed the plot, bludgeoning the 73-year-old Kimani. He then discarded the blood-stained weapons into a pit latrine and fled the compound.
In the morning, one of Kimani’s daughters, Joyce Wangiro, came over to the house after construction workers reported they could not access their tools because the house was locked from the outside. Believing the house was simply empty, Wangiro unlocked the door and walked inside. The quietness was shattered when she stepped into the bedroom and saw Kimani collapsed on the floor, lying in a large pool of blood, completely unresponsive, with visible and catastrophic injuries.
Upon discovering her father in that horrific state, Joyce Wangiro immediately screamed for help, which attracted nearby neighbors and relatives. Distressed and in deep shock, Wangiro’s screams brought immediate help from the construction workers and villagers living just a few meters away.
Because Kimani was still breathing, the immediate priority for the responding neighbors was saving his life rather than calling the police. They quickly organized transport and rushed him to the hospital in critical condition.
The police were notified shortly after he was admitted, bringing detectives from the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) and local officers from the Bahati sub-county to secure the cordoned crime scene.
Once the police arrived at the house, they secured the crime scene and began searching the property for evidence. Their immediate search led them to the compound’s pit latrine, where officers successfully retrieved the two bloodstained wooden rods used in the attack.
Later that day, Sunday, February 15, 2026, the DCI officially transitioned the case from a severe assault investigation into a formal homicide operation after Kimani tragically succumbed to his injuries at the hospital. The DCI detectives then brought in the immediate household members for questioning.
Detectives intensely questioned his wife, Tabitha Mangi, and his children regarding the locked-door timeline, the concealed rods, and mobile phone usage. Initially, the wife, Tabitha Mangi, and daughter, Rahab Muthoni, pretended to have no knowledge of how an outside intruder had entered their home. However, under separate, intense questioning, their timelines of who had the keys to the outer locks completely collapsed.
Mobile network data and text coordinates confirmed that the hitman did not launch a surprise break-in. Instead, the data synced with the family’s confession that they had physically welcomed and harbored the killer inside the home for two consecutive nights before providing him the window to strike the Mzee.
Relatives and grandchildren interviewed by the DCI admitted that the family had subjected the 73-year-old patriarch to long-term domestic mistreatment. They revealed a desperate, escalating push by the family to force Kimani into subdividing and selling his highly valuable peri-urban land. Cybercrime experts audited the suspects’ phones and discovered active mobile communication logs coordinating with an outside entity. This proved that the wife and daughter had explicitly contacted and contracted a local assassin to perform the execution.
Fingerprint and DNA swabs taken from the recovered rods showed hasty handling, proving that the family members rushed to dump the blunt weapons down the latrine the moment the assault was finished to make the evidence disappear. This airtight triangulation of digital footprints, physical forensic contradictions, and internal family admissions directly broke the case wide open, forcing the police to transition from treating the wife and the children as grieving relatives and officially classified them as the prime suspects behind the patriarch’s execution.
On Monday, February 16, 2026, the DCI officially placed the wife, Tabitha Mangi, the daughter, Rahab Muthoni, and two sons under formal arrest for murder and conspiracy to commit murder. The family members were first brought to court for a miscellaneous application on Tuesday, February 17, 2026, and were subsequently arraigned on Monday, February 23, 2026.
