Wednesday, August 21, 2013

Kenyan cannibal Alexander Kinyua pleads guilty in US court

 

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Alexander Kinyua (left) pleaded guilty of killing Ghanaian housemate Kujoe Bonsafo Agyei-Kodie (right) and eating his heart and brains in a US court August 19, 2013. FILE

In Summary

• Judge Stephen Waldron finds the defendant not criminally responsible for the act due to mental illness.
• Psychiatric assessment determines that Kinyua was suffering from paranoid schizophrenia.
• Kinyua, who was a Mechanical Engineering student at Morgan State University, will be committed to a mental health facility indefinitely.
• Percess Veronica Mattison, a longtime family friend of the slain Ghanaian tells court the murder had devastated the victim's family

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By BMJ MURIITHI

A Kenyan man who had been charged with killing a Ghanaian housemate and eating his heart and brains has pleaded guilty in a US court.

Alexander Kinyua, 22, told a Harford County judge in Maryland Monday that he killed his friend with an axe and ate his heart. But in his ruling, judge Stephen Waldron found the defendant not criminally responsible for the act due to what he termed as mental illness.

The ruling means that Kinyua, who prior to the bizarre incident was a Mechanical Engineering student at Morgan State University, will now be committed to a mental health facility indefinitely. He was quickly whisked away to the state's maximum-security psychiatric hospital after the ruling.

The court heard that on May 25 last year, Kinyua killed Kujoe Bonsafo Agyei-Kodie with an axe while he slept.

He also dismembered the body, consumed the heart, hid the head and hands in the home and placed the remaining body parts in a trash bin in a nearby church parking lot.

GRUESOME FIND

The gruesome find was made by Kinyua’s father, who called a Harford County detective and told him that he had come across two metal tins containing human body parts covered by a blanket in the basement laundry room, the court heard.

"The tins contained the head and two hands of the housemate who lived in Joppatowne, Maryland, and had been reported missing. Police found the rest of the victim’s remains in a dumpster,” said Harford County State's Attorney Joseph Cassilly.

On Monday, prosecutors made a grisly description of how the murder was committed saying they discovered a charred serving dish in which Kujoe dismembered hands and other body parts were placed.

Before the ruling, Percess Veronica Mattison, a longtime family friend of the slain Ghanaian told the judge that the murder had devastated the victim's family.

IRREPLACEABLE LOSS

"We all could see him soaring to great heights in the world. This was not to be," Ms Mattison said.

"He was slaughtered in the most brutal, inhumane fashion by Alexander Kinyua. This is an irreplaceable loss accompanied by much pain."

She disagreed with the psychiatrist’s findings that Kinyua was of unsound mind when he committed the crime.

"Someone acting with such care to conceal evidence, and demonstrating the capacity to cover his tracks so competently does not appear to be experiencing a mental deficiency," Ms Mattison said.

"Alexander did not impulsively commit the crime, he prepared Kujoe for consumption," she said.

But Kinyua spoke softly as he responded to questions from the judge. He said that the medications he has been taking were helping him.

A psychiatric assessment determined that Kinyua was suffering from paranoid schizophrenia, which is a mental condition.