Ex-boyfriend accused of setting Rebecca Cheptegei on fire dies from burns
Global News
Dickson Ndiema Marangach was accused of dousing his girlfriend, a Ugandan Olympic athlete, in gasoline and setting her ablaze.
The former boyfriend of Ugandan Olympic athlete Rebecca Cheptegei, who was accused of setting her on fire, has died from burns sustained during the attack.
Cheptegei, 33, died last week after suffering burns to about 80 per cent of her body. Her ex-partner, Dickson Ndiema Marangach, allegedly doused her in gasoline and set her ablaze over a land dispute. She had just recently competed in the marathon at the Paris Olympics.
Marangach succumbed to his own burn injuries on Monday, according to the Kenyan hospital where he was being treated. About 30 per cent of his body suffered burns after some of the gasoline used in the attack splashed on him and he was also set on fire, local media reported.
“He developed respiratory failure as a result of the severe airway burns and sepsis that led to his eventual death on Monday evening at 18:30 hours despite life-saving measures,” a press release from Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital said, according to the BBC.
The attack happened on Sept. 1 in western Trans Nzoia County, where Cheptegei lived near the Kenya-Uganda border. Cheptegei competed for Uganda in the Olympics but she lived in Kenya. Her parents said the long-distance runner bought land in Trans Nzoia to be near the county’s many athletic training centres.
Marangach allegedly ambushed his former girlfriend in her house after she returned home from church with her children, BBC News reports. It’s believed he snuck into Cheptegei’s home with a five-litre jerry can of gasoline after the couple had a falling out over the Trans Nzoia property.
Marangach was the main suspect in Cheptegei’s murder inquiry, but now that he too has died, the criminal case has been dropped and authorities will lead an inquest into the two deaths instead.
Cheptegei, who finished 44th in Paris, is the third elite sportswoman to be killed in Kenya since October 2021. Her death has put the spotlight on domestic violence in the East African country, particularly within its running community.
