Writes Leo Odera Omolo In Kisumu City.

[{Photos at the courtseyof the STADARD} ]

The sins of a brazen father now on the run; a love turned sour; and four wasted lives – three of them children too young to defend themselves against the person they all looked up to before hell broke loose.

Outside the house, the heavy rain battering the roof muted their final cries, including that of a helpless girl who was raped before being killed by her own father.

There was blood all over the beds in two different rooms. All four lay motionless — a mother and her three children gone in a flash, because of the murderous rage of a man who passed himself along as a caring father to the young ones, and a loving husband to Pamela Achieng, 38.

Nyalenda residents in Kisumu, Kenya, could hardly contain their tears after catching a glimpse of the scene where a man killed his wife and their three children, on Sunday.

He slit their throats in a grisly incident and ran away. Tears flowed as stunned and petrified residents of the grisly killings.

Speechless and numbed by the sheer horror of the crime, they just looked at the bodies —found more than six hours after the macabre killings. Some just wept uncontrollably.

The horror unfolded in Kisumu’s Nyalenda on Saturday night — and Kenyans came to know about it as they trooped to church on Sunday buoyed by the talk in town that this August would be as jinxed as all the others have been.

It was a chilling trail left by the bicycle operator said to have gone berserk, something his former neighbours cannot comprehend, especially when they look at the old family pictures from which the innocent children radiate a charming smile.

Defiled daughter

Signs of the feeble struggle Pamela and her children – Winnie Anyango (13) Michael Obwago (9) and Bryan Otieno, (6) put up were discernible from the panga cuts on their necks and heads, and the mess that was their once rented house.

The father reportedly also defiled his first-born, Winnie, in the incident believed to have taken place around 10pm. In one room, the bodies of the children lay on one bed in a pool of blood.

In another lay the mutilated remains of their mother.

The beds and sections of a wall bore blood. There were cooking utensils, water containers and a bicycle next to the bodies of the children, in what doubled up as kitchen and bedroom.

There were cries from children, women and men as the bodies were loaded into a police Land Cruiser.

Michael obwago, 9, Brian Otieno, 6, and Winnie Anyango who were killed in Nyalenda slums, in an earlier photo.

“Mungu wangu, mbona wameuliwa? Huu ni ukatili (My God, why have they been killed? This is inhuman),” wailed an elderly woman.

The women screamed and wailed as the bodies were removed to Nyanza Provincial Hospital and police gathered evidence.

The suspect, who ‘inherited’ Pamela six years ago under customary rites, disappeared to an unknown place, leaving the neighbours to speculate on what drove him into such barbarity.

Whatever differences he had with his wife, only he knows why he let the children bear the brunt of his anger.

Anyango was a Standard Seven pupil at Lutheran Church Primary School, less than 200 metres from their home, while her brothers were both attending Pandpieri Primary School, about a kilometre away.

When schools reopen next week, their desks will be empty, and their classmates traumatised and confused.

Pictures of the young ones taken about a year ago, and obtained by The Standard, show the children’s innocent faces, looking with hope into the future.

Police say they have launched investigations to apprehend the suspect.

Beastly act

“This is inhuman. It is difficult to comprehend why he killed them. We will arrest him, and he will face murder charges,” promised Kisumu police chief Mr John Mwinzi, at the scene.

Mr Mwinzi said the eldest child was defiled before being hacked to death.

“There are signs that the assailant defiled her daughter before hacking her. I have never seen such a beastly act,” conceded the crime buster.

He too explained the suspect could have taken advantage of the heavy rains that pounded Kisumu on Saturday night to murder his family.

Some neighbours reported they last saw the assailant at around 8pm, as he ventured out to take a bath.

Government officers carry bodies of the four family members hacked to death in Nyalenda slums, Kisumu.

Pamela, known to her friends as ‘Mama Winnie’ sold porridge at Oile Market. Those who knew her said she was friendly. Samson Odhiambo, a brother in-law, said she was ‘inherited’ by her killer six years ago.

“They have been (the deceased and suspect) living together for all this period. I got to know about the incident today at around 8am,” said Mr Odhiambo.

Judith Akinyi, an employee of Achieng, who is also her neighbour, said she only learnt of the bizarre killings in the morning.

“We woke up to find blood marks on their doorsteps. Upon entering their house, we found the bodies on the beds,” said a sobbing Akinyi. She revealed Pamela quarreled with her husband on Friday night