Family finds kin’s body after two months search

By Patrick Muthuri

The body of a 70-year-old man has been exhumed two months after it was buried by another family in Meru County.

The family of Misheck M’Lithara was relieved to find his body after it was wrongly identified as that of Francis Kirea by another family from Nthimbiri in Imenti North.

The family of M’Lithara hails from Igembe North.

Shocked residents of Nthimbiri watched in disbelief as police officers led exhumation of the body.

Mr Samuel Kabwi, the brother of M’Lithara said he was admitted to Meru Level Five Hospital in June where he passed on and the body was transferred to the morgue.

“My brother died on June 10 and his body was removed to Meru Level Five Hospital Mortuary. On June 15 we came for the body at around 11am but the mortuary attendant showed us a different body. We had to postpone the burial before embarking on the painful search,” Kabwi said.

Finger print

Mr Bernard Gituma, a son-in-law to M’Lithara said they made numerous trips to the hospital but the morgue staff could not produce the right body.

“The mortuary attendants were insisting that we take a different body. We visited the mortuary for five consecutive days without success. We decided to pay for finger print analysis, which showed the deceased’s name as Francis Kirea from Imenti North,” he said.

Nthimbiri Location Chief Judah Matumbi said the family of Kirea learnt that they had buried the wrong body after they received a court order allowing police to exhume the body.

“I received a report from the police that a family in my location had buried the wrong body two months ago. They have already confirmed that the body of their kin is still at the mortuary,” he said.

The chief blamed the mishap on the family’s failure to positively identify the body of their kin and the mortuary attendants for wrongly labeling the bodies.

But the morgue attendants, who did not want to be named for fear of being victimised, absolved themselves from blame, saying mourners are given enough time to positively identify a body before taking it away.

“We always give family members an opportunity to identify the body before we prepare it for them. We cannot deny them a body after they positively identify it,” said the morgue attendants.

The family of M’Lithara now wants the Meru Level Five Hospital administration to compensate them for the costs incurred and the pain they have undergone for 69 days.