Whatever happened to the good old stealing? Where crooks would break into a home, harass the victims without harming them and make away with cash or valuables. Odd as it may sound, there seem to be a growing trend where brave thieves break into houses, do all manner of weird things to their victims or feel at home, have fun and only leave at their pleasure.
Just last week, a group of six dangerously armed gangsters broke into the house of pastor Joseph Muraya of Deliverance Church in Mwiga, Nyeri County and spend the better part of the night ‘having fun’ in the house before making away with property worth thousands of shillings.
Once the miscreants were in the home, they held the family hostage by gagging and tying them with ropes, slaughtered two chickens prepared a sumptuous meal and feasted. Once they were done, they brew tea, which they used to wash down the heavy meal! The goons further pushed the joke by using the pastor’s car to ferry their loot by making four to and fro trips. Now if you are a thug out there reading this, beat that!
Crooks who break into churches
Still in the same county, crooks broke into, get this, a church in Chaka area and made a way with a trumpet, piano, pastor’s laptop, and public address system, among other valuables. Never mind it was in this very county where a young thirsty crook broke into a church and, of all the things, stole alter wine late last year.
So daring are thieves nowadays that one even broke into a powerful witchdoctor’s shrine the other day in Kirinyanga County and got away with stealing potent witchcraft paraphernalia and over Sh20,000 in cash. Really? Who does that! The witchdoctor issued a stern warning, threatening to bewitch the thief and make him go crazy and walk around naked if he didn’t return his tools of trade.
But the joke was on the witchdoctor. This was after locals turned him into a laughing stock after nothing of the sort happened to the suspect, days after the ultimatum lapsed.
Elsewhere in Kakamega County, a dozen of thugs took the game a notch higher last month in what perhaps was an attempt to prove that this country’s security is a big, bad joke. The daring goons broke — of all the places — into a policeman’s house in Lugari Town and, sadly, gang-raped his three daughters — aged between 12 and 16 — before making away with valuables.
Robbers warm leftovers, eat before leaving
Luckily for them, the policeman was not home. Claiming that they had a busy schedule and warning the policeman’s wife not to waste their time, they demanded his uniforms, firearms and her M-pesa pin number. So daring were the scoundrels that they warmed leftover delicacy, which they wolfed down before leaving, seven hours later. The cheek of it!
What’s more, this ugly incident came hot on the heels of an almost similar one days earlier in Matungu area in the same county. Gangsters armed with crude weapons broke into a home, gang-raped the woman of the house as her horrified husband watched before bolting away with electronic goods.
When reached for a comment, all that the Kakamega police co-ordinator Paul Kerich said was “we have launched investigations into the matter”. And perhaps to give credence to the president’s, “Usalama unaanza na wewe (corruptly translated to ‘you are on your own’ by most Kenyans)” rallying call, asked us to urge members of the public with information related to the matter to volunteer to the police!
In Kiamaiko, Kiambu County some ruthless thugs broke into a house of a couple, suspected to have had some good money after they sold some part of their land. While desperately trying to torture their elderly victims who lived by themselves to give them the cash, they heat an iron box, which they used to iron their buttocks! Unfortunately, all was in vain, seeing as the couple had no hard cash on them. The crooks made a way with electronics from the home.
Many other sad yet hilarious tales have been told of robbers who torture and beat up their victims, especially in slums, who don’t have cash or valuable. A close friend to this writer narrated a nasty ordeal in which he was early this year savagely clobbered, with his genitals squeezed for “not having a serious phone and with only Sh50 in my pocket with no other valuables on me”.
Thieves who target bulls’ testicles
The victim vowed to this writer that nowadays whenever he walks home late, he always ensures he has some substantive amount of money to peacefully bribe his way out of the ruthless hands of thugs who always lurk around his Nairobi’s Kariobangi neighborhood.
It gets even worse. Two months ago, residents of Ndaraweta area around Mau Forest in Bomet County had been forced to regularly stay awake, guarding their animals for the better part of the nights. This drastic measure had been taken following a wave of weird thieves who had at least raided three homesteads where they chopped off testicles belonging to all their bulls! It was believed that the culprits had links to witchdoctors who used the testicles in witchcraft-related activities.
An almost similar incident was witnessed in Nyeri County last month when residents of Rititi Village in Mathira, were left counting losses after thieves raided five homes in one night, slaughtered and made away with 71 kienyeji (free range) chickens. So clinical was the robbery that none of the villagers heard any commotion in all the five incidents. Never mind slaughtering one chicken alone is such a messy and noisy affair that mostly involves strangling the bird, leading to deafening guttural cluck-clucking sounds.
Esther Wanjiku, Mathenge Kinyua, Peter Mwaniki and others all reported having woken up to shocking scenes of their compounds littered with chicken innards, heads, legs and feathers, a clear indication the scoundrels had all the time to slaughter the birds before making away with the meat.
In the same month of September, there was a daring raid at Ndia-ini Factory in Nyeri County, which saw the robbers, who seem to had a lot of time, prepare and eat a meal of rice and chicken before making away with fifty-one bags of coffee, thirty nine chickens, a computer, 20 bags of fertilizer and chemicals valued at Sh91,000 and Sh5,000.
The five watchmen who were manning the factory were tied with ropes, gagged with rags and detained in a room as the robbery went on.
Robber who returned to seduce hot victim
Interesting to note is that these weird cases of robbery are not unique to Kenya. Far afield, for instance, in Ohio in the US, three robbers broke into a home, terrorised the occupants before stealing from them.
However, one of the crooks, identified as Stephon Bennett and believed to be overly randy, found one of the ladies, Diana Martinez, in the home ‘too hot’ to resist that he returned days later, trying to be all friendly in a bid to seduce her for a relationship. But like a clumsy rhino that he was, the bugger got carried away and let down his guard, leading to his arrest and prosecution.
Sky News also recently reported a tale of a robber who broke into a shop in the US and in a bid to beg him not to harm and steal from her, the religious victim, a 43-year old Angela Montez, convinced him to bow down for a short prayer for his problems, particularly lack of employment.
Interestingly, the robber obliged and even passionately hugged her afterwards. But despite the heart-to-heart talk and blessings, the goon still insisted he was too broke and had no other option but to make a way with some money and her phone, anyway.
Goons overpowered, raped by home owner
However, once in a while, thieves always get more than they bargained for. Take the case of two career burglars who made the reckless mistake of breaking into the house of a notorious American gay rapist early this month, only to be mercilessly sodomised for five days straight!
Garfield Morgan, 54, and his 36 year old accomplice Kim Gorton are likely not to go back to breaking into people’s homes after the nasty episode they experienced at the home of Harry Harrington in Florida.
Harrington is almost 7 feet tall and over 150kgs of pure muscle. He’s a notorious gay sex predator who has served time in jail for numerous sexual assaults. Basically, he is not sort of guy you want to annoy. Unfortunately, that is exactly what Morgan and Gorton did that fateful night.
Harrington, is reported to have overpowered them, tied them up and repeatedly raped them for five good days. Police only intervened after a neighbour heard them wail for help and called them. Well, what they went through was traumatizing, but who said crime pays?
In his defense, the gay rapist told police, “They broke in my front door, so I broke in their back doors!” All of them are likely to go to jail, for burglary and rape respectively.
