The United States government says the Kenyan police, under the prèsiency of William Ruto, have been heavily compromised, allowing themselves to be used as weapons of mass killings against anti-government demonstrators that staged protests between March and July 2023.

Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International attested that 30 persons died from police aggression during the protests. According to reports, some victims died after suffocating from teargas, and others died after getting shot by highly sophisticated police weapons. 

Citing the Independent Medico-Legal Unit (IMLU), a human rights group, the American government noted that 99 police stations were complicit in the extrajudicial killings of 111 persons, the youngest of whom was a three-year-old boy who died as a result of teargas inhalation.

Another victim, Erick Omondi Abok, died after getting shot in the head from a “high-calibre weapon”, which was most likely fired by a police officer at a far range.

Not only did the government try to cover up police-related killings, Kenyan authorities equally asked medical personnel to keep silent on deaths recorded from police brutality, the U.S. government learnt from the media.

“Media alleged police and medical practitioners who treated wounded protesters received orders not to report deaths resulting from the crackdown,” the U.S. 2023 report on human rights practices in Kenya stated.