Serial killer pleads guilty to killing 14 people in Rwanda
21 September 2023, 15:44
Denis Kazungu, 34, admitted charges including murder, rape and robbery.
A suspected serial killer in Rwanda pleaded guilty at a court on Thursday, saying he killed 14 people, most of them women.
Denis Kazungu admitted charges including murder, rape and robbery.
The 34-year-old appeared at Kicukiro Court in the capital, Kigali, and did not appear to show any emotion during the hearing.
Kazungu smiled as police led him into the courtroom.
Officers discovered 12 bodies on his property, but he said he killed an additional two people whose bodies have not been found.
Kazungu said he killed his victims because he claimed they intentionally infected him with HIV, but he offered no evidence of this.
The victims include 11 women and one man, authorities said.
The genders of the other two people Kazungu said he killed were not immediately clear.
Kazungu said he could remember the names of only three of his victims.
He requested that his trial be held behind closed doors so details about the case would not be publicised and others would be prevented from possibly being inspired to become serial killers.
Kazungu did not have a lawyer at the hearing and is expected to appear in court again on Tuesday.
Police alleged that the suspect lured people from bars to his home in a suburb of Kigali.
Though identities of his victims have not yet been officially released, a woman has appeared on local interviews claiming to have escaped from Kazungu and his accomplices.
Nobody else has been charged in the case.
Police said the suspect used different names in a bid to conceal his true identity.
The New Times newspaper quoted Kazungu’s landlord, Augustin Shyirambere, as saying the suspect had not paid rent for several months and denied access to the property. The landlord went to authorities for help.
One neighbour said the suspect was married and rented two houses, one for his family and the other unoccupied.
He owned a motorcycle spare parts shop, said the neighbour, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution.
Emmanuel Nizeyimana, the executive secretary of the Busanza neighbourhood where Kazungu lived, said the suspect had previously been detained over alleged robbery and rape but was later released. It was not immediately clear why.
