Detectives are pursuing crucial leads on the whereabouts of the man behind the macabre murder of a 24-year-old woman whose mutilated body was found stuffed in a paper bag off Thika Road in Nairobi.
It has also emerged the man used a hacksaw in his mission to dismember the body of the woman whose head is still missing.
Police suspect the man was on hire and he may have carried the body to show his masters he had accomplished the mission.
Using CCTV footage, and phone triangulation, the police have placed the suspect in the Ruaka area, Kiambu County where he seems to have been staying for days.
The team visited the area Monday and asked for footage of surveillance cameras on several buildings as part of the probe.
This will enable them to identify the suspect whose image was captured outside the apartment where he murdered the woman.
The woman's(whose identity has not been made public) family visited City Mortuary, Nairobi on Monday and identified her.
However, because key body parts were missing, they were asked to wait for further analysis of the samples collected from the body and close relatives before they made public any information on her.
The motive of the incident remains unknown, police said adding the suspect dismembered the woman’s body severing the limbs, arms and head from the torso.
He then wrapped the body parts in a bedsheet and paper bag.
There were marks of the hacksaw on the body when police arrived to pick it up at the mortuary.
It also emerged the man had called to book the room using a mobile number registered under a woman’s name.
The owner of the room referred him to an agent for room viewing.
He walked to the agent at the entrance of the apartment and declared he had been sent by the owner to view the room and needed the key and direction or guidance there.
All along, he had a cap and spectacles that police believed were meant to hide his identity.
Holding firmly in his hand was a black bag that police believe contained the hacksaw and other materials he used in his mission.
The suspect wearing a white cap and spectacles appeared to be in a hurry.
Police say the suspect had made the call on Saturday, January 13, at about 3 pm.
After viewing the room, he returned five minutes later.
He went back to the agent who asked him to pay the Sh2,000 for the night through mobile money payment a but he said his mobile account had issues and had the cash.
He called the owner again and handed the phone to the agent to speak to her to be allowed to pay for the room in cash, which has emerged to be another trick he used to hide his identity, police said.
This was the last time the suspect was captured. It wasn't until about 8 pm when the woman arrived and told the guards she was joining him at the Green House Apartment House B1.
According to police and the management at the apartment, he was expected to return the keys on Sunday morning but failed to do so.
The proprietor of the room, Risper Muthoni, said she received a call from the caretaker who discovered body parts inside the trash bag in the house.
The deceased woman had intimated to a friend that she had gone to have dinner with a friend in Roysambu but failed to turn up a day after and her phone was switched off.
Police believe the man murdered her hours after she had arrived, dismembered the body parts and arranged them in a bed sheet and later paper bag, cleaned the house and took the same to the dustbin at about 5 am. The woman’s clothes were also missing.
Preliminary findings show the man used fake documents and a mobile number registered under a woman’s name to book the room.
Apart from a few images obtained from CCTV cameras in the area, police have nothing more to hold onto as they pursue the suspect.
“He seemed to have acted in rage and we fear he might kill more,” an officer in the probe team said.
The team is working to release the captured images of the man to the public to help identify him. The woman was stabbed and chopped to death in an apartment along TRM Drive, Thika Road.
CCTV footage of the incident showed a man in black jeans, a black jumper, a navy blue shirt, specs, and a white cap booking the one-roomed house above a supermarket.
Nairobi police boss Adamson Bungei said they are looking for the suspect behind the murder.
He said the attendant and owner of the premises are helping police with the probe.
“The owners of the premises need to be keen when handling those booking rooms. We are pursuing leads that may help us,” he said.
Police moved the remains to the Nairobi City Morgue awaiting autopsy and identification.