A man accused of killing his girlfriend in Boston and fleeing to Kenya has been extradited back to the United States.
This is the latest development in an international case that involved his arrest at a Nairobi nightclub and subsequent escape from jail, reports AFP.
Kevin Kangethe, 42, is accused of killing nurse Margaret “Maggie” Mbitu, whose body was found in a parked car at Boston’s Logan International Airport last November, two days after she was reported missing.
After the alleged crime, he immediately boarded a flight and fled the country.
Following his arrival in Kenya, the suspect managed to evade authorities for months.
However, in January, investigators located Kangethe at a nightclub in Nairobi and took him into custody.
He later escaped from jail, but was rearrested in Nairobi in early February after being on the run for a week.
Kangethe’s extradition on Sunday has brought him back to the jurisdiction of his alleged crime, which is some 7,000 miles away. He is expected to face a murder charge at Suffolk Superior Court today, as announced by Renson Ingonga, Kenya’s director of public prosecutions.
“I wish to reiterate my commitment and support, whenever needed, to the United States of America, and in particular the prosecution team as they proceed with the next phase of the case,” Ingonga said in a statement yesterday.
Mbitu, 31, lived in Whitman, a Boston suburb, and was the youngest in a family of health care workers. Her two older sisters and her mother are all nurses.
She was reported missing in late October after she didn’t show up for work, which was uncommon for her.
Her family notified the police and called nearby hospitals to check if she was a patient. Investigators believed her boyfriend was a suspect, according to a criminal complaint from the state police.
With the help of surveillance cameras, police tracked his Toyota SUV to the airport and found it in a parking garage. Inside they found Mbitu’s bloodied body with slash wounds on her face and neck, Massachusetts State Police said in an affidavit.
The day before her body was found, Kangethe boarded flights from Boston to Kenya. Surveillance footage showed him leaving the parking garage and entering an airport terminal, police said.
Investigators learned he had bought a plane ticket the previous morning, state police said.
“Why her?” her sister, Ann Mbitu, told CNN in November.
“Nobody’s daughter deserves this, but why my sister? Why Maggie? I’m so angry, I’m still trying to process everything. At 31, we’re not supposed to be planning her funeral. We’re supposed to be planning celebrations, birthdays, weddings, travel.”
Kangethe has been arrested twice with the help of tipsters.
After he arrived in Kenya, he eluded authorities for three months. Then in late January, someone alerted police that a man at a nightclub in Nairobi resembled images of the suspect they’d seen on social media, Kenyan authorities said.
An undercover officer tracked him down and struck up a conversation with him, a police official told CNN. Within hours, authorities identified the man as Kangethe, whom authorities in Massachusetts had obtained an arrest warrant on a murder charge.
A week later, a man claiming to be his lawyer appeared at the police station where he was being held and asked to speak with him. Officers released the suspect from his cell and left them alone in an office. The suspected escaped on foot and evaded authorities for days, police said.
He was re-arrested a week later at a relative’s house in a suburb of Nairobi after another tip-off, Kenyan police said.
Kevin Hayden, District Attorney of Suffolk County in suburban Boston, thanked the US State Department, the FBI, the state police, the Kenyan government and Kenyan law enforcement agencies for facilitating the arrest.
“Their tremendous and untiring efforts will provide Margaret’s family and friends the opportunity to see Kevin Kangethe face justice for this terrible crime,” Hayden said in a statement in February.
Investigators have not revealed a motive in the killing.
