What started as a welfare check on a missing neighbour ended in horror in Dindiruku village, Mwea, Kirinyaga County, after residents discovered the body of 40-year-old Peter Munene concealed beneath his own bed.
Munene had been reported missing since Sunday, November 8. It was only after those living nearby began noticing a foul smell drifting from his rented house that alarm bells rang loud enough to prompt a search.
A Night of Argument Before He Vanished
Joseph Kabashio, a close friend who had helped Munene find the house, told reporters the two had spent that Sunday afternoon together at a local bar.
He said that around midnight, he heard Munene engaged in a heated argument with a woman Munene had reportedly been seeing for no more than two weeks.
The next morning, when Kabashio went to call on his friend as the two typically worked casual jobs together, there was no sign of Munene.
He asked the woman about his whereabouts, and she reportedly told him Munene had simply stepped out.
Days passed with no word from Munene. It was only after the smell from the house grew too strong to ignore that neighbours raised the alarm and the grim truth emerged.
Body Hidden Beneath Buckets and a Suitcase
Kabashio was among those who entered the house when the search intensified. What he found inside left him shaken.
“When I entered the house, I found my friend under the bed, and there was a bucket and a basin and a suitcase placed as if to hide the body so no one could see,” he said.
The arrangement of objects around the body suggested a deliberate effort to conceal it from anyone who might enter the room.
A woman Munene had allegedly been in a brief relationship with is reportedly suspected of involvement in his death. Investigators are said to be pursuing the matter further.
