Garissa University terror attack ‘mastermind’ commits suicide in jail- officials

A convict who was serving life sentence for the Garissa University terror attack that left at least 150 people dead was Friday found dead in his cell at the Kamiti Maximum Prisons, Nairobi after an apparent suicide.

Police and prisons officials said Rashid Charles Mberesero, 26 who is a Tanzanian national committed suicide using a piece of blanket he was using in his cell 24 at Block H.

His body was found hanging on the window’s metal grill inside his cell with the piece of blanket tied around his neck minutes after he had died.

Kamiti Maximum main prisons head of security Mark Keitany told Shahidi News that the incident occurred at about 3pm after the convicts had had their last meal of the day.

“We do not know what motivated him to the incident,” he said.

Mberesero had appealed his sentence and the case was pending at the Milimani law courts. 

Police were called to the scene and picked up the body straight to the mortuary.

The deceased was on July 3, 2019 alongside two others convicted over the April 2015 incident.

He had denied the charges. 

His co-accused, Hassan Edin and Mohamed Abdi, who are Kenyans were imprisoned for a jail term of 41 years each. They remain incarcerated.

The three had been found guilty of conspiracy to commit a terrorist attack and of belonging to the Al-Shabaab terror group. 

The university attack was the second deadliest in Kenya after the infamous Al-Qaeda bombing of the US embassy in 1998 killed more than 200 people.

Mberesero was then given the longest  prison term because he was arrested at the scene of the massacre and could not explain his presence there, the court was told.

The prosecution said during the trial that on the day of the attack – April 2, 2015- he remained in the hostel and could not explain why he was there.