“The British Army cannot continue to ignore the murder of our friend”

For more than a decade, after Agnes Vanjiru, a 21-year-old mother, was killed in Kenya, allegedly by a British soldier, a Kenyan court has issued an arrest warrant for a United Kingdom citizen. If there is an extradition, it will be the first time a servant or a former British soldier has been sent abroad to be brought to court for the murder of a civilian – a move that her friends would welcome.

At the night she disappeared on March 31, 2012, Agnes asks her childhood friend and friend B to come out with her.*

Agnes and friend A were both new mothers, both 21 years old, and both wanted to release some steam.

Friend B would also not go out and agreed to meet them at the Lions Court Hotel – located in a Nanyuki business neighborhood, a market city in Central Kenya, about 124 miles (200 km) north of Nairobi.

That evening, friend B’s mother agreed to watch Agnes’s five -month -old daughter for a small fee for watching a child. With the children who are settled, Agnes and a friend left, making their first stop at a bar called Sherlock.

“There were many men from Muzung (white),” says friend A. “I remember some in ordinary clothes and some were in army clothes.”

The British Army has a permanent basis for supporting Nanuki training, and white men, many of them soldiers, were known. The locals referred to them as Johnny, a nickname, who carries unscrupulous connotations.

“They made me unpleasant because I heard bad things about the Muzunga men,” a friend recalls.

“Muzungus don’t treat us with Kenyan women well,” adds friend B. “Jonis, especially, abuse us. They neglect us.”

For young women, such as Agnes, the risks of engaging with these men are often weighed against the fight to connect the edges.

“When women are financially desperate, they will do almost anything to survive,” says friend A., “However, I do not believe that Agnes was a sexual worker. I never saw her do it. She was very poor.”

Her friends tell her that on a good day, Agnes will win about 300 Kenyan shillings – less than £ 1 ($ 1.35). There was nothing on a bad day at all, and she relied on the goodwill of her loving sister.

Agnes had no financial support from her child’s father, and her friends tell her that she is constantly trying to make money, mostly working in salons and braided people’s hair, sometimes it becomes more non -traditional means.

One method, a friend recalls, was simple: Agnes would be friends with someone who offered to buy her a drink, then quietly ask the bartender to skip the drink and give her the money instead.

At Sherlock’s Bar, a friend A night was scroll through Facebook when he noticed Agnes in what looked like a tense exchange with a white man.

“When I approached her to ask her if she was fine, she told me to go to the Lion Court of the plan and that she would join me soon.”

A friend A sequel to the hotel, where friend B and several others were already dancing. There was also a crowd of white men.

Agnes joined them shortly after.

She told her friends that she had “tried to take Muzungu’s wallet, but had intervened. The question seemed resolved, her friends say. And her friends Agnes seemed calm.

“She was in a high mood,” says girlfriend A. “She was joking around.”

Around midnight, a friend left for home, leaving friend B and Agnes and their friends dance.

“Muzungus bought us drinks, and Agnes returned them to the bar in exchange for money,” added friend B. The two started mixing with other friends. A little later, girlfriend B says she saw Agnes leave the bar with one of the white men and suggested that they had reached a consensus arrangement. Other reports say Agnes was seen to leave with two menS

The next morning, friend B went to Agnes’s house and saw his worried sister, who told her that Agnes did not return. She rushed to the house of her own mother, where she found Agnes’s baby still in her care.

By the early evening, when Agnes had not yet returned, a friend B and another friend went to the Nanyuki Police Department to report their missing and return the baby to Agnes’s sister.

For days, Agnes’s friends have been looking for her. At Lions Court, a guard told them that there was a “big battle” in one of the hotel rooms and a window was broken over the weekend.

Nearly three months later, Agnes’s body was found in a septic tank near the hotel. She was stabbed. A friend B and another friend went to the morgue to see Agnes’s body.

“I felt awful,” says friend B. “I couldn’t imagine anything like that could happen.”

It will be years before the assassination of Agnes Vanjiru to attract wider attention.

The Kenyan judge Njeri Thuku ended after investigating in 2019 that Agnes was killed by one or two British soldiers. The Sunday Times has been extremely revealed that the murder of Agnes, allegedly from a British soldier, is well known among the troops in NanyukiS The publication reported that the soldier was hit by the army but continues to live freely in the UK.

“I believe there are many men responsible for Agnes’s death,” says friend A. “Many men know what happened and many of them have covered it.”

Inertia built again in 2024 when Open Democracy reported that the British army failed to discipline soldiers For payment for sex Although such behavior is explicitly prohibited in 2022.Following the allegations involving troops of the United Kingdom in Kenya.

This caused an internal investigation in August 2025, which revealed that some soldiers in the base still participated in transaction sex with women, many of whom are vulnerable, forced or transferred to sexual work.

In April this year, The United Kingdom Defense Minister John Heli met with the Agnes familyIn Kenya, in order to offer her condolences and to issue a statement stating that the British government “will continue to do everything possible to help the family provide the justice they deserve.”

On September 16, The Kenyan Supreme Court issued an arrest warrant for a British citizen suspected of the murder of Agnes Vanjiru.

If extradited, it will be the first time a serving or former British soldier has been sent abroad to be a civilian murder court.

“A positive step is also very welcome to the arch of justice,” says Kelvin Kubai, a lawyer at the African Center for Correctioning and Preventive Actions. “However, the battle has not yet been won, given the legal obstacles of extradition production and we hope that the relevant government institutions of both countries will continue to cooperate in order to meet the ends of justice.”

Agnes’s niece, Esther Neuki, created a Gofundme page to raise money in support of the family, travel to the United Kingdom and create more awareness of the murder of his aunt.

“We have to insist on financial security for Agnes’s daughter,” Esther says, adding that he is now a teenager.

And Agnes’s friends agree that justice has been slowed for too long.

“The British Army cannot continue to ignore the murder of our friend,” says friend A. “We want justice for Agnes and her daughter.”

The BBC has asked the Ministry of Defense for comment.

*BBC changed the name of all people listed as witnesses from the Kenyan High Court