Ex British Serviceman Accused of Murdering Kenya Female Appears in Court

A suspect has shown up before a judge as extradition hearings began in the case of Agnes Wanjiru, a woman of Kenyan origin who was killed near a British forces camp in the year 2012.

The accused Robert Purkiss, 38, who is a native of the Manchester area, appeared before the Westminster court on Friday, and informed the court he planned to fight the deportation. Reports indicate that he was taken into custody on Thursday night.

An arrest warrant for Purkiss was released by a court in Nairobi in September. The state attorneys informed the Kenyan judiciary that Purkiss had been charged with a single count, of homicide, and that the Kenyan authorities would request his deportation to stand trial.

Purkiss served formerly as a medical attendant with the regiment of the Duke of Lancaster, the military regiment for the English northwest, including on missions to Afghanistan.

The victim, twenty-one, a hairdresser who had a baby daughter, disappeared after a night on the town, and her corpse was discovered two months later in the area of the lodging where she had last been seen.

Not a single person had previously been detained or charged in connection to her passing. Purkiss’s arrest followed a fresh police investigation, which came after a exposé in the year 2021 by a Sunday newspaper, in which the media outlet reached out to several current and former soldiers in the military group.

This inquiry has been spearheaded by detectives in Kenya, which, under a bilateral security treaty, retains jurisdiction in the matter.