A year of grief: Woman dies after losing husband and three children

Lilian Njeri (left) and Felistus Njeri wife to Francis Muturi at Muturis house in Limuru. Their husbands died in an accident on April 2 2025.[File]

Barely a year since a family in Limuru lost six members in a road tragedy, death has come knocking again—this time claiming Felistus Njeri Muturi, the wife of Frank Muturi, who died together with his three children in the grisly accident that occurred last year in Naivasha.

According to a family source,  Felistus Njeri began feeling unwell after the tragedy that claimed the lives of all her children, Fidelis Waithira, 14, Catherine Wanjiku, 12, and Victor Kirubi, 8, as well as her two brothers-in-law, Peter Mwangi and George Ngugi.

The family was travelling back home from a family event when their vehicle collided with a truck near High Peak Schools. As fate would have it, they had just attended a memorial service for a relative, a cleric who had passed away.

Felistus Njeri's health began deteriorating immediately after the news of the deaths broke, and since then, she had been in and out of hospital.

On the day of her family's burial, Felistus was conspicuously absent. Family sources said she had developed further complications and had been taken for treatment in Kiambu.

Throughout the mourning period for her family, Felistus Njeri was on constant medication, with doctors suspecting that the shock of the deaths had taken a heavy toll on her.

The bodies of her husband, her three children, and two brothers-in-law were lowered into a grave in her absence, at the family’s land in Naivasha.

At their Kamirithu village in Limuru, a number of neighbours and relatives spoke in hushed tones as they came to terms with the incident that has shaken them to the core.

“We are here again after a year or so. We are tongue-tied and completely defeated. There are news stories that are easy to stomach, but Felistus’s death has refused to sink in. This family is now finished, there is no father, no children, and now the mother is gone. How much more can we take?” a neighbour told The Standard.

A family member, who sought anonymity, told The Standard that the pain they felt last year had barely left them, and now the healing wounds have been reopened by Felistus's death.

“To me, it’s like a sad movie. I am completely lost; I cannot piece these events together. Felistus was our only hope, the one we could still look to in our late brother’s house. Now she is gone. Shall we close this house now?” she posed.

The family source added that this year had been particularly hard for Felistus, as she had been looking weak even after showing signs of recovery and normalcy last year.

“Unbeknownst to us, the good signs were only for a short time before this thunderbolt hit us. We shall lay her to rest this Wednesday,” she said.