Residents of Mokowe in Lamu West have been left in shock after a Lamu-based General Services Unit (GSU) officer took out his family before turning the gun on himself on Sunday morning.
The 5am incident saw four gunshots ring out, prompting neighbours to visit the GSU officer's house, where they met a harrowing scene.
According to neighbours, upon entering the house, they discovered three lifeless bodies – that of the officer, his wife and their young daughter.
In an incident which stemmed from a domestic dispute, the wife was shot twice, while the daughter died from a single bullet wound. After taking his partner's and daughter's lives, the officer turned the gun on himself.
Area County Commissioner Wesley Koech confirmed the incident as neighbours revealed the couple engaged in a heated argument on Saturday evening before tensions boiled over on Sunday morning.
“We heard a loud bang, which startled us. When we rushed outside and gathered other neighbours, we found that a fellow resident had been killed by her partner,” one neighbour told reporters.
The three family members' bodies have since been moved to the Mpeketoni Sub-County Hospital mortuary as police continue to investigate the motive and circumstances surrounding the tragedy.
This is the latest case of a police officer going rogue, with incidents of officers turning on their kin or themselves being on the rise in recent months.
Earlier in April, there was a similar case in the Kakdhimu area in Rachuonyo West Sub-county, Homa Bay County, where a police officer took the lives of three children, including two of his own, before ending his own.
The officer, who was based in Marsabit County, is believed to have committed the heinous act in his rural home while he was on leave.
Investigations by authorities into the murder and subsequent deadly self-harm uncovered a note believed to have been left behind by the officer.
In an attempt to mitigate the cases of officers with struggling mental health, the National Police Service (NPS) established a counselling unit complete with staff to attend to officers whose mental health was deteriorating.
