Lawyer Kyalo Mbobu was shot three times by gunman on a motorbike, probe shows
Slain lawyer and lecturer Mathew Kyalo Mbobu was shot at least three times and at close range as he sat in his four-wheel drive car along Magadi Road, Nairobi.
Investigations show he had nil chances of survival after the shooting.
Mbobu, a former chairman of the Political Parties Disputes Tribunal, was shot and killed on Tuesday September 9, 2025 at about 5.30 pm as he drove to his Bogani residence in Karen, police said.
The assailants did not steal anything from him. He was alone in the car at the time of the shooting.
The gang rode off after their mission. A team of detectives from the Directorate of Criminal Investigations headquarters and the Homicide Unit combed the scene on Tuesday for clues.
The gunman behind the shooting had been dropped by his rider and walked casually to where Mbobu was seated in his car and in a traffic jam before opening fire using a pistol that he had.
Police collected three spent cartridges from the car.
And after shooting the author and law lecturer, the gunman ran back to a waiting motorcycle and boarded it before it sped off.
Other riders who witnessed the shooting tried to chase him in vain.
They told police they retreated after the gunman shot to the air twice ostensibly to scare them as the rider raced back to the city centre. Police believe the man was targeted for murder.
They returned there on Wednesday as others started to trace his last movements as part of the probe into the murder.
Preliminary investigations show Mbobu had earlier driven from his office in the city centre along Koinange Street and went for lunch at a joint along Jakaya Kikwete Road.
Police visited the restaurant on Wednesday to establish who met.
After the lunch, he drove alone towards Dennis Pritt Road before joining Woodlands Road, Valley Road, Raila Odinga Road and later Langata Road.
Police who have reviewed security footage say he then joined Magadi Road at a slow pace as traffic was building up.
Outside the Galleria Mall the killers were captured on the security cameras trailing Mbobu’s car.
They trailed the car as it moved at snail pace past Brookhouse School up to a drift where the traffic stopped. The security cameras captured the rider riding past the car before he made a U-turn and the pillion passenger who was the gunman alighted about 40 meters away where the lawyer’s car had stopped in a traffic jam.
The gunman, according to police, walked to the driver’s side of the lawyer and found the window shield half closed.
It was then that the gunman pulled the trigger hitting the layer in the chin and head at least three times. The window shield was shattered.
The four-wheel drive car moved at a slow pace and hit a matatu that was ahead of it as the passengers, alerted by the gunshots scampered for their safety.
Other boda boda riders who operate in the area sped to the scene in attempts to stop the attackers but were scared after the gunman shot to the air as they rode off from the scene.
Mbobu’s body was found slammed in the car with the engine running.
The incident caused a huge traffic jam that stretched for kilometers before the scene was cleared hours later.
Police handling the case said they are yet to establish the motive as they moved the body to the mortuary.
It is not clear if his murder is related to his work. Detectives said they are investigating the motive.
A similar shooting had happened in April 2025 and left Kaspul MP Charles Were dead.