Police believe the officer who grabbed a gun from his colleague intended to rescue a terror suspect who was in custody for investigations over radicalisation of children/COURTESY K24
NAIROBI, Kenya, Jul 14 – Eight police officers were killed in the nine-hour siege at the Kapenguria Police Station on Thursday -including a General Service Unit commando who was in the rescue team sent from Nairobi.
The rest were the station commander, four police officers and their rogue colleague who stormed the station at 5.30am and started shooting indiscriminately until 2.30pm when the hold-up was brought to an end.
Inspector General of Police Joseph Boinnet had earlier sent out a statement saying it was a terror suspect in custody who grabbed a gun from a police officer and started shooting.
But details emerging from Kapenguria later painted a different picture of the situation at the end of the siege.
“It is an off-duty policeman who walked into the station and took the gun from a colleague whom he shot dead alongside others, before taking over the station,” one senior police officer briefed on the situation said. Police earlier said a terror suspect had been killed ending the siege but later clarified that the dead man thought to be the terrorist was still in the cells at the station. They had mistook the body of the officer who grabbed the gun to be that of the terror suspect.
Police Spokesman George Kinoti later issued a statement saying “the gunman who had a turban that covered his entire face leading to the previous suspicions, sadly killed six officers within the station building.” He said all the inmates in the cells were safe.
Police believe the rogue officer who grabbed a gun from his colleague intended to rescue a terror suspect who was in custody for investigations over radicalisation of children.
The siege was ended when officers from an elite squad of the GSU were flown there.
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