The prime suspect in the killing of Linah Keza, a Rwandan stabbed to death in the wee hours of Wednesday, is now in police custody, British media reported yesterday. This is contrary to earlier speculation that David Kikaawa, 38, had committed suicide at his brother’s club, 791, after the killing. Keza, 30, was allegedly stabbed from her home in Leyton, London. The pair had a two-year-old daughter. “We have just received news that the alleged killer, Kikaawa, is not dead. His heartless friends cooked up the suicide story to hide his whereabouts,” Jack Hodari, Keza’s elder brother in Kigali, said yesterday. “We are in touch with the [Rwandan] High Commission and plans are underway to bring Keza’s body for burial in Kigali. Her daughter, Holly, is being taken care of and treated for trauma and other consequences.” Efforts to get details on the latest development from the Rwandan High Commission in the UK were futile as our e-mail enquiry was not replied to by press time. But mourners, yesterday, continued to flock the deceased’s uncle’s home at Kisementi, Remera, in Kigali, where the vigil is being held. Hodari dismissed media reports that Keza was previously married to the suspect. “We want to state that Keza wasn’t at anytime married to the man who killed her. She had a baby with him but they broke up because of the man’s violent behaviour,” Hodari said. “He one time tried to strangle her when she was pregnant. They never lived together.” Appeal for respectMeanwhile, Hodari appealed to the media to avoid speculation about her sister’s death and give the family some peace in these trying moments. Keza’s neighbours who spoke to The Standard, UK, described the former model as a “dotting mother” who was loved by everybody on the block.Ghulam and Shazia Mohyuddin told Police they heard screams in the flat above them as the victim called for help. Mohyuddin, 47, said: “My wife heard screaming and was really scared. There was screaming then the door upstairs banged. Someone came running down the stairs,” The Standard reported. “She was lovely and her and her daughter were always smiling. It is such a shock; we can’t sleep because we think of the screams and what happened to that poor girl.” Keza was born in Uganda in 1983. She attended part of her primary education in Uganda, before her family repatriated to Rwanda after 1994, where she joined Nyagatare Primary School in Eastern Province. Keza completed secondary education at the former Kigali International Academy, now Kagarama SS, before joining Kigali Institute of Science and Technology. She left for UK a decade ago and had lived there since.
