Crime scene
Prominent clinical psychologist and mental health researcher in Kenya, Dr Victoria Mutiso is dead.
Mutiso was shot dead by gunmen on a motorcycle near Kenyatta National Hospital on Wednesday morning.
Police confirmed the shooting adding she died in hospital where she was rushed after the attack.
The researcher was in a taxi when the gunmen on a motorcycle struck and opened fire. This was after a four wheel drive car had blocked the taxi.
Police who visited the scene said the deceased had been trailed from her home near the Junction in Kilimanj area before being shot at close range.
Nairobi police boss Issa Mohamud said they have clues they are pursuing in the attack. “This was a targeted murder and we are pursuing the killers,” he said.
Mutiso had reported threats to her life. She made the report at Kilimani police station after gunmen on a motorcycle drew and pointed a gun at her in a traffic jam.
Police were pursuing the matter. She also planned to solemnise her marriage in weeks which is also believed to have triggered her elimination. She was a mother of two. There had been family squabbles over property which police believe is part of the motive of the murder.
Senior officers visited the scene. Police said they were pursuing good leads on the killers who escaped the scene.
A spent cartridge was recovered at the scene and sent for ballistic tests. Mutiso specialised in youth mental health, substance abuse, and community health integration. She was the head of research at the Africa Mental Health Research and Training Foundation (AMHRTF).
Her research interest is on child and adolescent mental health, development and adaptation of culturally-appropriate tools and interventions around promotion of mental well-being and prevention of/or delay of the onset of mental illness and especially severe mental illness in young people in under-served and marginalised populations in urban informal and rural settings in Kenya.
She was principal as well as Co-Investigator on several mental health projects at AMHRTF alongside other collaborators locally and abroad on mental illness, neurological conditions and substance abuse in Kenya.
She was the co-lead on project “HOPE” - NIHR Global Health Research Group on Homeless People with severe mental illness in Africa (HOPE). In addition, she has several publications on various aspects of public mental health in Kenya.
