Kenya extradites suspect in US murder

People check into their flights at Boston Logan Airport in Boston. (File photo: AFP)

NAIROBI: Kenyan prosecutors said Monday they extradited a man accused of murdering his girlfriend in the United States in a case that made headlines after he escaped police custody in Nairobi.
Kevin Kang’ethe was the subject of a three-month international manhunt after he fled the United States for his native Kenya following the killing of Margaret Mbitu, who was found stabbed to death in a carpark at Boston’s Logan airport in November.
He was arrested in Kenya in January, but after just one week in detention Kang’ethe slipped out of a holding cell, to the deep embarrassment of the Kenyan police.
He was recaptured in February while hiding out at a relative’s home on the outskirts of Nairobi.
The Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (ODPP) said in a statement that Kang’ethe had left Kenya on Sunday and would face a murder charge at a court in Boston on Tuesday.
Director of Public Prosecutions Renson Ingonga had assured FBI director Christopher Wray during talks in Nairobi in June that his office was “keen to ensure justice involving this case is done in an expeditious manner,” the statement said.
Four police officers, two relatives and a lawyer were arrested in connection with Kang’ethe’s jailbreak.
Just last month, in another humiliating incident for Kenyan police, a suspected serial killer accused of murdering and dismembering dozens of women escaped from another Nairobi police station.
Police launched a major manhunt after Collins Jumaisi escaped along with 12 Eritrean detainees on August 20 but he has yet to be found.