A new report unveiled the truth about a deadly trend raging across Kenya Over 1000 Women Killed in Kenya in 10 Years. Between 2016 and 2025, at least 1,069 women died, with 102 women being murdered in 2025 alone. The study, named Counting the Cost: A Decade of Femicide in Kenya (2016-2025), is based on media reports and court documents.
A noticeable characteristic was the age of the victims, most of whom were between the ages of 18 and 35 years, equivalent to around 65% of the total.
These perpetrators are most often someone close to them. Research establishes that most of the women were killed by men they knew well; in most cases, they were the women’s husbands. There are evident trends in the perpetrators in many cases, with husbands representing nearly half of the annual murder count.
The threat is also extended beyond personal environments. There has been a surge in boyfriend-related violence, which resulted in about 32% of the killings in 2025 being attributed to killings by a boyfriend. Ex-lovers and other relatives also make appearances in certain cases.
Home should be a haven, but it has turned out to be the worst place for women, given that more than 60% of the murders that occurred in 2025 happened within homes, while public places are not any safer as one in every five murders has occurred outside of homes.
Stabbing continues to remain at the top, followed by the use of blunt objects, hacking, and strangling.
In addition to external delays, judicial delays make the problem worse. The justice system is a slow process; a case can take four to six years to be finalized and even longer, seven years, in counties such as Kitui and Machakos.
Outcomes of convictions do not make the full picture. In fact, while it is true that in 93% of the cases that concluded in 2025, convictions were achieved, the fact of the matter is that the vast majority of cases never have a conclusion. In fact, fewer than 10% of all cases filed between 2016 and 2024 have been brought to a close.
Similarly, there is also a pattern in sentencing, as husbands are often convicted of manslaughter as opposed to murder, sometimes as part of plea bargains, resulting in lighter sentences, such as 17 years on average as opposed to 21 years for those in other families convicted
