A 45-year-old man has reportedly died by suicide in Matungulu, Machakos county.
The man's body, according to police, was found dangling from a tree near his home in Tala location, Matungulu subcounty on Thursday evening.
The matter was reported to the Tala police station by a local administrator as a suicide incident report shortly after the body was discovered at the scene.
Police said the cause of death was yet to be established since the deceased left no suicide note.
The officers removed the body to a mortuary in Nguluni within Matungulu subcounty.
Police have launched investigations into the incident.
Tala chief Francis Mulinge urged locals to seek professional counselling services when overwhelmed by issues instead of ending their own lives by suicide.
Machakos County police commander Patrick Lobolia in October 2024 decried the rise in suicide cases in the county.
Lobolia raised concerns over the increased suicide rates noting that Kathiani subcounty was leading in such incidents followed by Kangundo, Masinga, Yatta, Matungulu, Machakos, and Mwala, while Athi River subcounty reported the least numbers of suicide cases.
He said those who end their lives through suicide include children as young as eight years old, youth, women and men of all ages ranging between 30 to 50 being the majority.
Lobolia, however, noted that more men were dying by suicide in the county than women.
He noted that the majority of the victims left no suicide notes.
Lobolia said their investigations revealed that some of the suicide incidents were out of relationships, property or inheritance disputes in families, among other undisclosed reasons.
He said drug and substance abuse usage could also be contributing to the incidents.
Elsewhere in Masinga, Machakos county, members of the community policing in Kithyoko rescued a week-old infant abandoned near a toilet in Kithyoko market.
The area community policing chairperson Daniel Mutunga who accompanied his colleagues during the rescue mission said it was suspected that the boy's mother wanted to throw him into the toilet but found it locked.
It was at that point that she abandoned the child next to the toilet's door and escaped.
Mutunga said the baby's health condition had been checked at the Kithyoko health centre.
He said they had launched a search for the mother.
