Former UK Soldier Charged of Killing Kenya Woman Shows Up in Court

An individual has been presented in court as extradition proceedings started in the legal matter of the victim Agnes Wanjiru, a Kenyan woman who was killed near a British forces camp in 2012.

Robert Purkiss, thirty-eight, who is originally from the Manchester area, was presented at Westminster magistrates court on Friday, and informed the court he planned to fight the deportation. Reports indicate that he was detained on the evening of Thursday.

An arrest warrant for Purkiss was released by a court in Nairobi in September. Legal prosecutors informed the Kenyan judiciary that Purkiss had been accused of a single count, of murder, and that the Kenyan government would pursue his extradition to stand trial.

He previously worked as a medical attendant with the Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment, the infantry regiment for the north-west of England, including on missions to Afghanistan.

Agnes Wanjiru, 21, a beautician who had a baby daughter, disappeared after a evening out, and her remains was located two months later in the premises of the lodging where she had last been seen.

Not a single person had previously been taken into custody or charged in relation to her death. The arrest of Purkiss came after a new police inquiry, which came after a report in 2021 by a Sunday newspaper, in which the media outlet contacted several serving and ex-military personnel in the unit.

The investigation has been spearheaded by detectives in Kenya, which, under a bilateral security treaty, maintains prosecutorial power in the case.