A Husband in Handcuffs: Unmasking the Mystery Behind Hannah’s Murder

It began like any other Tuesday in Nakuru… a city where dust rises with the morning sun and dreams are traded over plastic counters and mobile money transactions. In that bustling web of ambition, 23-year-old Hannah Waithera was living proof of what quiet determination looks like. A young wife, a doting mother to a three-year-old girl, and a familiar figure behind the glass window of her small M-Pesa kiosk on Kenyatta Avenue. To the strangers who passed by, she was just another woman doing her job… but to those who knew her, she was the family’s hope… the promise of better days. That morning, Hannah smiled her usual smile, counted out her float, and texted her husband, Zacharia Wanjohi, that she’d stop by the salon later in the day. He sent her KSh 1,500 for it. She stepped out with KSh 250,000 in cash… just another routine deposit. And then… she vanished.

By 3 PM, her employer had filed a report with the police about the missing funds. By 6 PM, Zacharia, concerned that his wife hadn’t returned or answered her phone, went to Nakuru Central Police Station to report her missing. But instead of urgency, he met bureaucracy. Officers told him to wait… insisting on a 24-hour delay before logging a missing person report. They cited standard protocol… but what they delivered was indifference. No attempt to trace her phone… no canvassing of Kenyatta Avenue’s many surveillance cameras… no alert sent out to taxi drivers or local hospitals. Hannah’s last known phone location had already pinged around Kijabe… far from her usual route… but the officers remained unmoved. By the time the police would even agree to listen, the trail had already grown cold.

And just when the family thought things couldn’t get worse, betrayal came not in the form of criminals… but men in plainclothes claiming to be from the Directorate of Criminal Investigations. They stormed Hannah’s family home with fury… demanding answers… ransacking the house… and assaulting her husband and relatives. They took KSh 49,350… money the family claimed was their personal savings… and offered no identification, no warrants, and no explanation. Mary Njeri, Hannah’s mother, sat frozen in the corner as her world collapsed around her. “We were already grieving… already scared,” she later recounted. “Then they treated us like we were the ones hiding her… like we had killed her ourselves.”

Five days after Hannah disappeared, on the cold morning of May 26, workers at Technology Farm in Nakuru West Sub-County began complaining of a foul smell coming from a hidden trough within the maize fields. When they investigated, they found what no one was prepared for… a decomposing body… half-submerged and covered with dry grass. Police were called, and the remains were collected and taken to Nakuru City Mortuary. For two days, the body lay there, unidentified… until May 28, when Mary Njeri walked in and collapsed at the sight of her daughter’s clothing. “How do I explain this to her baby girl?” she cried. “She keeps asking where her mother is.” The police would later confirm the worst… Hannah had been murdered… likely killed elsewhere and dumped at the farm. The decomposition had gone too far to determine visible injuries. But even in death, Hannah was stripped of her dignity… discarded like refuse.

And just as Nakuru began to mourn, the story twisted once again.

On June 3, the Directorate of Criminal Investigations arrested Zacharia Wanjohi… Hannah’s husband… and arraigned him in court as the prime suspect. Investigating officer Corporal Richard Kipsang revealed to the court that mobile phone records showed Hannah and Zacharia’s phones moving together on the day she disappeared… contradicting Zacharia’s initial claim that her phone had been traced heading toward Kijabe. The DCI now believed he had misled investigators and potentially obstructed justice. Police requested 21 more days to detain him as they compiled forensic DNA evidence… analyzed mobile phone data… reviewed CCTV footage… and gathered witness statements. Zacharia’s lawyer objected… arguing that he had cooperated fully and that his right to bail was being violated. But the court, presided over by a Nakuru magistrate, ruled in favor of the DCI. The next hearing is set for July 3, 2025.

And while the legal process trudges forward… a deeper wound festers.

Mary Njeri is struggling to reconcile two versions of her son-in-law… the man who wept beside her… and the man who, if the evidence is true, betrayed her daughter in the worst way imaginable. “If it’s him… if he did this… then he killed more than just Hannah,” she said softly. “He killed trust. He killed family.” Across the city, other M-Pesa agents… many of them young women… are left shaken and scared. These women walk daily with tens or hundreds of thousands in cash… with no bodyguards… no armored vans… and little protection except hope.

But the spotlight has also revealed just how deeply flawed the system is.

Why did the police dismiss a missing woman simply because 24 hours hadn’t passed? Why did they prioritize a stolen cash report over a mother’s alarm? Why was the family harassed by unknown officers… or possibly impostors… with no follow-up… no apology? The Nakuru DCI office has yet to confirm whether the raid on the family home was conducted by legitimate personnel or rogue criminals posing as law enforcement. Either answer is terrifying. If it was the DCI, it speaks of abuse and corruption. If not… it means law enforcement is so broken that it can no longer distinguish its own officers from predators.

Activists and civil society groups are now calling for an overhaul of the “24-hour rule” for reporting missing persons… particularly in high-risk categories like women, children, and cash handlers. They argue that those first few hours are critical… and in cases like Hannah’s… deadly. Meanwhile, the M-Pesa agent community is demanding protection… panic buttons… secure deposit mechanisms… dedicated police liaisons. Because as it stands… every agent is on their own.

And then there’s the silence. The long, painful silence of a justice system too slow to act… of a family haunted by images they can’t unsee… and of a daughter who still asks why her mother hasn’t come home. For now, Zacharia remains in custody. The DCI says they are analyzing evidence and preparing charges. The case is active… but to the family and many Kenyans, justice is already late.

Hannah was not just a name… she was a life. A heartbeat in the rhythm of Kenya’s economic engine. She was the woman who woke up early… served her neighbors… and tried to build something from nothing. And now, she is a statistic… a cautionary tale… a headline.

She was kind… she was ambitious… she was failed.

And this… was

#VCDigest

VC Digest Fan Club