A man allegedly hacked his wife to death then buried her in a shallow grave behind their house in Kanduyi, Bungoma county, after a quarrel.
Jared Nyongesa, 27, was described on Saturday as a jail bird who is always drunk.
His mother Selfa Nyongesa told journalists this morning that he and his wife quarreled most of Friday night.
"They went to sleep after supper at our house but my husband and I did not see his wife today so we inquired but he refused to tell us where she was," she said at Jared's home near Bukembe market.
"He threatened to kill his father and I for disagreeing with him on how he had been treating her."
Selfa said she alerted police who conducted a search and eventually suspected that the man's wife was dead and buried behind their house.
She said that Jared, her third born son in a family of six children, did not work and "drank alcohol day in, day out".
Selfa said the couple met in prison, had been together for six months and did not have children.
Neighbours asked police to find and arrest the man. Officers launched a manhunt,
retrieved the body and took it to the mortuary at Bungoma referral hospital.
The crime came two weeks after a man in Bukembe cut his wife in the head during a squabble.
The woman is fighting for her life at the referral hospital.
County commissioner James Kianda attributed cases of domestic violence across the country to the drinking of illicit brews
He asked couples to seek advice from religious leaders and elders when they disagree "instead of engaging in uncouth and beastly acts".
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