17/08/2026
A kitchen knife was found placed in her hand, and a roll of bhang was placed between her lips. The scene appeared staged to suggest it was her own planning. Police assessed that she had been kil*ed on the Monday night, given the state of the body.
Pauline Wangari Ngoi was found in her small rental room in Kiharu estate, Murang’a. Her colleagues forced the door open on Wednesday morning after she failed to report for duty at Murang’a GK Prison for two consecutive days.
She was 24. She had graduated from Ruiru Prison Training College in 2017, been posted to Murang’a, and had only recently turned 24 on 20 April. Friends described her as a beauty queen who liked to party, went out to local clubs when off shift, and had no shortage of male company. She lived alone, a few hundred metres from the prison gates.
The man responsible was Joseph Otieno Ochieng, 23, a mechanic and self-described artiste from Nairobi, originally from Kisumu. They had talked on Facebook for weeks, possibly months. Monday night was the first time they met in person. He arrived at her house around 9 p.m. CCTV in the building recorded him entering. They smoked bhang together and had s*x. An argument then developed.
One part said she refused harder drugs he offered after the bhang. Another said that after they finished she became angry and told him she was a prison officer—something he had not fully understood and accepted. The quarrel turned physical. He first strangled her until she collapsed, then stabbed her repeatedly with a kitchen knife in the chest, neck, and abdomen. He then arranged the scene to make it appear she had done it herself: the knife placed in her hand, a roll of bhang between her lips, and the body left on the bed.
When her colleagues forced the door open on Wednesday, the bedsheets had hardened and darkened with blood from the extensive bleeding. The body had already started to decompose, consistent with death having occurred on the Monday night.
He remained long enough to take items. When he left around 3 a.m., the same CCTV cameras recorded him carrying her television, a large bag of hers, and her mobile phone. He walked out of the building with her property and disappeared into the night.
Her colleagues discovered her on Wednesday. Investigators recovered the CCTV footage. A friend of Pauline’s who viewed it at the DCI offices recognised the tattooed man. Peterson Njiru, described as her boyfriend and a regular visitor, was arrested first and held while the main suspect was still at large. He was later released once the principal actors were identified.
Ochieng was stopped on Thursday at a roadblock in Kericho County while heading toward Kisumu with two other people—Rogers Namukolo and Mary Amollo—in the vehicle. The three were brought to Murang’a. Detectives stated that Ochieng gave an account of the Facebook contact, the first meeting, the bhang, the s*x, the fight, the kill*ng, the staging of the scene, and the theft of property.
The stolen items were recovered. Pauline’s body was taken to the Murang’a county morgue for post-mortem examination, then home to Naishi village in Njoro, Nakuru County. On 21 May her mother, Lucy Wangui, stood over the coffin and said she would never again see her daughter smile. Prison officers carried the casket. The burial was marked by the knowledge that another young woman had been ki*led in what the press repeatedly called a crime of passion.
Cash bail was denied. He was charged with murder contrary to sections 203 and 204 of the Penal Code in Criminal Case No. 7 of 2019.
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