2024 Nairobi City Marathoner Willy Chelawa found dead

Willy Chelawa, an athlete who participated in the 2024 Nairobi City Marathon is dead.

He was found dead at a hotel in Kaptagat.

The news of his death was confirmed by Elgeyo Marakwet Police Commander Peter Mulinge.

The cause of his death remains unknown.

He joins a list of marathoners who have died in the last few years.

Last weak Ugandan athlete Rebbecca Cheptengei was buried after she died days after being doused in petrol and set on fire by a former boyfriend.

The 33-year-old Ugandan marathon runner, who competed in the recent Paris Olympics, had suffered 80%  burns after the  attack.

 Damaris Muthee Mutua

Damaris, 28, was found dead in Iten in 2021.

Her boyfriend, an Ethiopian, was the suspect in the killing. Police found her decomposing body in the house.

Mutua’s body was found on the bed in the boyfriends home. She had been strangled. According to the police, the man confessed to a friend that he had killed her, then went into hiding.

 Agnes Tirop

Agnes Tirop, a former world cross country champion, was murdered in 2021, at her Iten home.

Tirop has supposedly told her siblings that she wanted to leave her husband Rotich. She said that he had been spending her money at bars while she was away, and that she was tired of it.

He was suspecting she was having an affair and pointed fingers at her childhood friend. 

Tirop was found stabbed and beaten to death in her home.

Rotich had fled, leaving a note, reportedly confessing to the crime and saying that the relationship had been “full of fights.”

Police found a knife and a club at the scene. Rotich later admitted in an affidavit to killing Tirop, but pleaded not guilty to her murder, claiming that he was provoked into killing her because he believed she was having an affair with her childhood friend:

She was buried on what would have been her 26th birthday.