A woman who was arrested after her four children were found dead in Naivasha will be charged with murder.
Police say Beatrice Kimotho, 42, is the prime suspect. The children were strangled on Saturday morning.
Relatives believe she could have suffered a bout of depression because she had recently been retrenched because of Covid-19 and had ran out of cash to take care of the children.
The murdered children were identified as Melody Warigia (eight years), Willy Macharia (6) both pupils of Milimani Primary School, Samantha Njeri (4) and Whitney Nyambura (2).
A police source said that the woman regretted having not taken her own life as planned after killing her children.
“She is very composed and has admitted to killing the minors using her hands and planned to also take her life due to financial challenges but ended up in a bar where she was arrested,” he said.
Naivasha OCPD Samuel Waweru confirmed the incident, adding that the woman will be charged on Monday with murder.
"We have a sad story where a woman has killed her four children and we have opened an inquest file while the bodies have been taken to the local mortuary," he said.
According to a brother to the suspect, Jackson Kimani, the sister who worked with an NGO in Naivasha was laid off two months ago due to Covid-19.
He said this left her in depression as she could not afford to feed her four children. The murders caught hit them with shock, he said.
"We knew something was amiss due to some comments she had posted on the family Whatsapp group and on coming to inquire we found that she had killed the four children," he said.
A neighbour, Andrew Opiyo, said they had seen the minors playing the previous day but got concerned on Saturday after their house remained closed.
He said that the woman could have been mentally disturbed and called on people to speak out about their challenges and should not resort to suicide or murder.
"The minors were very jovial and we are trying to come to terms with their deaths and what could have driven this woman to commit such an incident," he said.
Edited by Henry Makori
