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Famed for lying directly on the equator, the town of Nanyuki has now become linked to a dark event. This is the place where Agnes Wanjiru was born and lived, and tragically murdered.

Weeks passed as her relatives hunted for her, when her body was found stuffed into a waste tank at the exact hotel where she was last seen.

Growing Up

Agnes was cared for by her parent, who did what the family lovingly called “small jobs,” such as cultivating, while bringing up her five kids.

The eldest daughter, Rose Wanyua Wanjiku, was then came a male sibling, James Mwangi, next Cecilia Muthoni, and lastly Francinsca Njoki. Agnes was the baby.

For all her 21 years, Agnes resided in Nanyuki. Whenever she travelled, it was just to see her sibling Cecilia, who lived a few hours away.

School and Hobbies

She started her early education at a local primary school, and afterward enrolled at Gakawa secondary school. She enjoyed learning and her preferred subject was English literature.

Agnes also was passionate about music—she would often be caught humming or dancing.

She liked working in the kitchen and using her free time with her extended family. As a sister, daughter, and aunt, Agnes was trustworthy and caring, her family shared. She was also witty.

“She was always making jokes, beaming,” recalled her younger relative Esther Njoki. “We were frequently chuckling thanks to her jokes.”

Her Dreams Cut Short

Growing up, Agnes would look after her younger nieces, spending time plaiting their hair. In time, she transformed her pastime into a vocation; she began training to be a hairdresser in 2010.

She graduated from her training in August 2011. A handful of months later, before she had the opportunity to truly launch her new career, she was killed.

As she was wrapping up her studies, Agnes was also heavily pregnant. Her daughter Stacey was born on 20 October the same year.

“Agnes’s emotions about having a child was like the greatest joy in the world,” Esther Njoki said.

She loved her infant but found it hard to provide for her. Like several locals in Nanyuki, Agnes would earn additional income from selling sex. The nearby military camp brought a constant stream of custom.

The Night She Disappeared

Military personnel would visit Nanyuki to socialize, and many would purchase sex with residents, often multiple in one night, offering them sometimes just the equivalent of £1 a time.

Agnes would frequent bars in the town to meet her friends and dance. The night she went missing, 31 March 2012, unfolded as usual. She went to the a popular spot, a common haunt of British soldiers, to join her friends Florence Nyaguthii and Susan Nyambura.

They said her joining them at about 11pm and the three women having a good time together. Agnes was drinking a beer that she mentioned to her friends had been given to her by a British soldier.

Rather than going back as she had every other night, Agnes vanished. The morning after, her friends and family had received no word from her.

They visited the hotel where she was last seen, and devoted weeks trying to find Agnes, before her body was discovered two months later.

Lasting Impact

Agnes’s death has had a profound effect on her family. Stacey was five months old when she was separated from her mother and does not remember her, but has been emotionally scarred after finding out how she died.

“We have been experiencing moments where she sees something about her mum and she breaks down,” Njoki said, “and that’s because of trauma.”

Njoki and her mother, Rose, have borne the pain of Agnes’s death for over a decade. “You just keep on remembering Agnes, about the case, and you just feel bad,” she confided.

“It’s really traumatising, for sure, and upsetting, and our hearts are broken.”