The former boyfriend of Ugandan Olympic athlete Rebecca Cheptegei, who was accused of setting her on fire, has died from burns sustained through the assault.
Cheptegei, 33, died final week after struggling burns to about 80 per cent of her physique. Her ex-accomplice, Dickson Ndiema Marangach, allegedly doused her in gasoline and set her ablaze over a land dispute. She had only in the near past competed within the marathon on the Paris Olympics.
Marangach succumbed to his personal burn accidents on Monday, in response to the Kenyan hospital the place he was being handled. About 30 per cent of his physique suffered burns after some of the gasoline used within the assault splashed on him and he was additionally set on fire, native media reported.
“He developed respiratory failure as a result of the severe airway burns and sepsis that led to his eventual death on Monday evening at 18:30 hours despite life-saving measures,” a press launch from Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital mentioned, in response to the BBC.
The assault occurred on Sept. 1 in western Trans Nzoia County, the place Cheptegei lived close to the Kenya-Uganda border. Cheptegei competed for Uganda within the Olympics however she lived in Kenya. Her mother and father mentioned the lengthy-distance runner purchased land in Trans Nzoia to be close to the county’s many athletic coaching centres.
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Marangach allegedly ambushed his former girlfriend in her home after she returned dwelling from church together with her youngsters, BBC News stories. It’s believed he snuck into Cheptegei’s dwelling with a 5-litre jerry can of gasoline after the couple had a falling out over the Trans Nzoia property.
Marangach was the primary suspect in Cheptegei’s homicide inquiry, however now that he too has died, the felony case has been dropped and authorities will lead an inquest into the 2 deaths as a substitute.
Cheptegei, who completed forty fourth in Paris, is the third elite sportswoman to be killed in Kenya since October 2021. Her dying has put the highlight on home violence within the East African nation, notably inside its working group.
Rights teams say feminine athletes in Kenya, the place many worldwide runners prepare within the excessive-altitude highlands, are at a excessive threat of exploitation and violence by the hands of males drawn to their prize cash, which far exceeds native incomes.
“Justice really would have been for him to sit in jail and think about what he had done. This is not positive news whatsoever,” mentioned Viola Cheptoo, co-founder of Tirop’s Angels, a help group for survivors of home violence in Kenya’s athletic group.
“The shock of Rebecca’s death is still fresh,” Cheptoo informed Reuters.
Cheptoo co-based Tirop’s Angels in reminiscence of Agnes Tirop, a rising star in Kenya’s extremely aggressive athletics scene, who was discovered lifeless in her dwelling within the city of Iten in October 2021, with a number of stab wounds to the neck.
Ibrahim Rotich, Tirop’s husband, was charged together with her homicide and has pleaded not responsible. The case is ongoing.
Nearly 34 per cent of Kenyan women and girls aged 15-49 years have suffered bodily violence, in response to authorities knowledge from 2022, with married girls at specific threat. The 2022 survey discovered that 41 per cent of married girls had confronted violence.
Globally, a lady is killed by somebody in her circle of relatives each 11 minutes, in response to a 2023 U.N. Women examine.
— With recordsdata from Reuters
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