It was on New Year's Eve 2023 that the 34-year-old Benjamin Kiplagat was found dead in his car on the outskirts of Eldoret in western Kenya.
As early as the next day, two men could be arrested on suspicion of murder, and after a nine-month-long trial, the verdict has been handed down, reports news agency AFP.
Kiplagat's relatives wanted the men – 30 and 25 years old – to be sentenced to death or life imprisonment, but the sentence is 35 years in prison.
Planned murder
I just hope that the family will find comfort in the court's decision, said Judge Reuben Nyakundi according to the Kenya Star newspaper.
The judge states that the murder was planned. Footage from surveillance cameras shows how the two men on a motorcycle followed Kiplagat in his pickup when the 34-year-old was on his way home.
Athlete Kiplagat ran 3,000 meters hurdles at two Olympic Games – 2012 in London and 2016 in Rio de Janeiro. He won silver at the World Junior Championships on the distance in 2008 and bronze at the African Championships in 2012.
The murder of Kiplagat is one of many murders of successful athletes in Kenya in recent years. Above all, it is women who have been affected.
Burned to death
Last autumn, Ugandan Rebecca Cheptegei – a marathon runner at the Paris Olympic Games last summer – was burned to death in Kenya. The perpetrator was her boyfriend, who later died from the burns he sustained during the act.
In 2021, Kenyan Agnes Tirop, who was a World Championship bronze medalist on 5,000 meters, was killed. Her husband is charged with murdering her, but denies the allegation.
In 2022, Kenyan long-distance runner Damaris Muthee Mutua was killed, and her boyfriend was suspected of the murder.
