The family of a Murang’a man alleged by police to have died by suicide inside Kenol Police Station has dismissed the official account, insisting there are unanswered questions surrounding his death.

The man, identified as 35-year-old Stephen Mwangi, was found dead on August 5 in the station’s operations room. His father, John Muiruri, said after viewing the body at Murang’a Level Five Hospital mortuary that he does not believe the police version of events.

“I do not buy the police fairy tale that my son hanged himself. Even if he were to, not in the plot that the police are spinning,” Muiruri said.

He said Mwangi, who was from Njora village in Kigumo Constituency, had been missing for a week before his death. “We thought he would return, as he had a habit of leaving and later coming back,” he added.

On Monday, Muiruri said, he was called by the village elder and asked to go to Kenol Police Station.

At the station, he met a Directorate of Criminal Investigations officer who told him they had identified his son’s body and narrated what had happened. Muiruri said the officer’s account “made me feel like laughing despite my grief.”

According to the officer, Mwangi allegedly “sneaked” into the station, entered one office, then moved into another, locked himself inside and first tried to hang himself using a phone charging cable, which broke.

He then reportedly used a computer charging cable tied to window grills to take his life.

When Muiruri asked to see the location, he was told it was the operations room where anti-riot weapons are stored. “I asked how such a critical office was unmanned and accessible. The officer replied, ‘It happens, sometimes it happens,’” he said.

The father said officers who accompanied him to the mortuary offered to pay for the post-mortem and burial costs, which he found suspicious.

The family has declined the offer for a DCI post-mortem and will instead hire a private pathologist while also seeking help from human rights organisations. He called on the Independent Police Oversight Authority to investigate the matter.

Murang’a South police boss Charity Karimi maintained that initial investigations indicate Mwangi died by suicide.