John Anthony Kaiser was a Roman Catholic priest

Priest

A priest is a person authorized to perform the sacred rites of a religion, especially as a mediatory agent between humans and deities. They also have the authority or power to administer religious rites; in particular, rites of sacrifice to, and propitiation of, a deity or deities...

 who was murdered in Morendat, Kenya

Kenya

Kenya , officially known as the Republic of Kenya, is a country in East Africa that lies on the equator, with the Indian Ocean to its south-east...

 by unknown assailants.

Early life

John Anthony Kaiser was born in Perham, Minnesota

Perham, Minnesota

As of the census of 2000, there were 2,559 people, 1,104 households, and 642 families residing in the city. The population density was 976.2 people per square mile . There were 1,167 housing units at an average density of 445.2 per square mile...

. John attended Saint John’s Preparatory School, and the St. John’s University

College of Saint Benedict/Saint John's University

The College of Saint Benedict , for women, and Saint John's University , for men, are partnered liberal arts colleges respectively located in St. Joseph and Collegeville, Minnesota, USA. Students attend classes and activities together, and have access to the resources of both campuses...

 in Collegeville, Minnesota

Collegeville Township, Minnesota

As of the census of 2000, there were 3,516 people, 669 households, and 559 families residing in the township. The population density was 111.1 people per square mile . There were 721 housing units at an average density of 22.8/sq mi...

 for two years before he joined the army

United States Army

The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...

 in 1954. He was a paratrooper, and advanced to the rank of Sergeant. He graduated from Saint Louis University

Saint Louis University

Saint Louis University is a private, co-educational Jesuit university located in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. Founded in 1818 by the Most Reverend Louis Guillaume Valentin Dubourg SLU is the oldest university west of the Mississippi River. It is one of 28 member institutions of the...

 in 1960, with a BA in English Literature. While in St. Louis, he joined the Knights of Columbus

Knights of Columbus

The Knights of Columbus is the world's largest Catholic fraternal service organization. Founded in the United States in 1882, it is named in honor of Christopher Columbus....

. From here, he went to St. Joseph Seminary in Mill Hill

Mill Hill

Mill Hill is a place in the London Borough of Barnet. It is a suburb situated 9 miles north west of Charing Cross. Mill Hill was in the historic county of Middlesex until it was absorbed by London...

, England, where he studied from 1960 to 1964. Fr. Kaiser was ordained in St. Louis

St. Louis, Missouri

St. Louis is an independent city on the eastern border of Missouri, United States. With a population of 319,294, it was the 58th-largest U.S. city at the 2010 U.S. Census. The Greater St...

 for the Mill Hill Fathers

Mill Hill Missionaries

Mill Hill Missionaries is a society of Catholic missionaries founded in 1866.-External links:* * * http://www.vocationsireland.com/missionpriests/millhill.html...

 in 1964, and was sent to their missions in Kenya

Kenya

Kenya , officially known as the Republic of Kenya, is a country in East Africa that lies on the equator, with the Indian Ocean to its south-east...

.

Maela refugee camp

John spent 20 years in the missions in the Kisii Diocese." Over that time, the Catholic population had doubled, so that 48 priests were ministering to more than half a million Catholics in the diocese, many living in grinding poverty. In 1993, he was reassigned to the Maela refugee camp in the Ngong Diocese. Refugees fled to the camp as a result of tribal violence, armed gangs driving them from their homes, and then torching the buildings. Kaiser and others thought the government was fomenting the violence as part of a land grab. Amid international attention, on Christmas Eve, 1994, the camp was closed and the refugees were forcibly resettled. Kaiser protested the closing, but he was arrested, beaten, and released into the dangerous bush. Following these events, Kaiser was reassigned to preach to the more distant Maasai at Lolgorian Parish.

In 1998, at great personal risk, Fr. Kaiser testified before the Akiwumi Commission, investigating the causes of the violence and the closing of the camp. In public, sworn testimony, Kaiser fingered prominent cabinet ministers in the incumbent government, as well as the then-President, Daniel arap Moi

Daniel arap Moi

Daniel Toroitich arap Moi was the President of Kenya from 1978 until 2002.Daniel arap Moi is popularly known to Kenyans as 'Nyayo', a Swahili word for 'footsteps'...

. His testimony was quashed. The report of the commission was released on October 18, 2002. It confirmed the charges made by Fr. Kaiser, "indicted ... senior officials" and "accused senior officials of giving inflammatory speeches and in some cases, financing persons responsible for the violence."

He had also helped two schoolgirls in summer 1999. The girls claimed they had been raped by Julius Sunkuli, a cabinet minister in the Moi government. Sunkuli is alleged to have offered money for an abortion, but the girl, a fourteen year old named Florence, decided to keep her baby. Kaiser put the girls in touch with the Kenyan Federation of Women Lawyers, FIDA-Kenya. The attorneys submitted the evidence to the government, but Sunkuli was never charged. Instead, police stormed the building where the girls were hiding.

Troubles with the Kenyan government

In November, 1999, the Kenyan government tried to deport Fr. Kaiser, claiming that his work permit had expired. Kaiser briefly went into hiding in Kisii before he was granted a new work permit, but only after intervention by the US Ambassador Johnnie Carson and Bishop Colin Davis of Ngong.

In March, 2000, the independent Law Society of Kenya presented Fr. Kaiser with its annual Human Rights

Human rights

Human rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...

 Award, for his public testimony before the Akiwumi Commission and his support of the two girls. They called him "a study in courage, determination and sacrifice on behalf of the weak, oppressed and downtrodden."

Fr. Kaiser knew of the dangers of speaking out in Kenya, and of a fate which had captured many others. In a book about his experiences at the Maela camp, he wrote a warning.

Death and aftermath

On August 23, 2000, Fr. Kaiser was shot in the back of the head with a shotgun, which was nearby. His body was found at 6 am the next day beneath two acacia trees, by a butcher named George at Morendat junction on the Nakuru

Nakuru

Nakuru, the provincial capital of Kenya's Rift Valley province, with roughly 300,000 inhabitants, and currently the fourth largest urban centre in the country, lies about 1850 m above sea level...

-Naivasha

Naivasha

Naivasha is a market town in Rift Valley Province, Kenya, lying north west of Nairobi. It is located on the shore of Lake Naivasha and along the Nairobi - Nakuru highway and Uganda Railway.Naivasha is part of the Nakuru District...

 road in western Kenya. He was carrying documents he intended to present to the Akiwumi Commission. He was also to testify against the Moi government before the International Criminal Court

International Criminal Court

The International Criminal Court is a permanent tribunal to prosecute individuals for genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and the crime of aggression .It came into being on 1 July 2002—the date its founding treaty, the Rome Statute of the...

 in the Hague

The Hague

The Hague is the capital city of the province of South Holland in the Netherlands. With a population of 500,000 inhabitants , it is the third largest city of the Netherlands, after Amsterdam and Rotterdam...

 in three weeks. The first police officers on the scene thought he had been murdered.

Less than a week after Fr. Kaiser's death, Florence Mpayei dropped her rape case against Julius Sunkuli.

Kenya's chief government pathologist and a pathologist from an independent human rights organization present at the autopsy thought Father Kaiser was killed from a muzzle distance of about 3 foot (0.9144 m), from which suicide would be impossible. However, an FBI expert from Texas, who did not examine Fr. Kaiser but only saw photographs, concluded that Kaiser had committed suicide. The Moi government readily agreed.

Both houses of the United States Congress

United States Congress

The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....

 passed a joint resolution calling Fr. Kaiser’s death "an assassination," and calling for the US State Department

United States Department of State

The United States Department of State , is the United States federal executive department responsible for international relations of the United States, equivalent to the foreign ministries of other countries...

 to investigate.

The papal nuncio

Nuncio

Nuncio is an ecclesiastical diplomatic title, derived from the ancient Latin word, Nuntius, meaning "envoy." This article addresses this title as well as derived similar titles, all within the structure of the Roman Catholic Church...

, the Most Rev. Giovanni Tonucci

Giovanni Tonucci

Monsignor Giovanni Tonucci is a Latin Rite Italian archbishop of the Catholic Church. He was recently named the Territorial Prelate of Loreto...

, said at Father Kaiser’s funeral in the Nairobi

Nairobi

Nairobi is the capital and largest city of Kenya. The city and its surrounding area also forms the Nairobi County. The name "Nairobi" comes from the Maasai phrase Enkare Nyirobi, which translates to "the place of cool waters". However, it is popularly known as the "Green City in the Sun" and is...

 basilica, "The church, through pitiless violence, has once more been deprived of one of her ministers. Let no one have any doubts about it: we are celebrating a religious occasion; we are reflecting on a religious assassination, not a political one. Fr. Kaiser has been murdered because he was, and in the eternity of God still is, a Catholic priest who preached the Gospel. Those who killed him, those who planned his killing, wanted to silence the voice of the Gospel.... Only two days before his death, I met Fr. Kaiser for a long conversation. At the end, he asked my blessing, which I reluctantly gave him. At that moment, I thought it would have been better if he, an old and worthy missionary, had blessed me. How much more I am convinced of that now that we look at him as a martyr of the faith?". Also present at the altar was His Eminence Maurice Cardinal Otunga

Maurice Michael Otunga

Maurice Michael Otunga , Cardinal and Archbishop emeritus of Nairobi and Military Ordinary emeritus for Kenya, was born in Chebukwa, diocese of Kakamega, Kenya.-Early life and ordination:...

, Archbishop

Archbishop

An archbishop is a bishop of higher rank, but not of higher sacramental order above that of the three orders of deacon, priest , and bishop...

 Emeritus of Nairobi.

The Law Society of Kenya renamed its annual award the Fr. Kaiser Human Rights Award. A new Kenyan government

Elections in Kenya

Elections in Kenya in recent years have been cause for violence and fragmentation, such as during the presidential elections of 2007. Though a multiparty democracy since 1992 and holding elections since 1962, the country has serious institutional problems which make it hard for elections to be...

 was elected in 2002. Since then, the Kenyan National Human Rights Commission posthumously honored Fr. Kaiser with its 2006 Milele (Lifetime) Achievement Award. Fr. Kaiser also posthumously received the Twin Cities International Citizen Award from the cities of Minneapolis

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Minneapolis , nicknamed "City of Lakes" and the "Mill City," is the county seat of Hennepin County, the largest city in the U.S. state of Minnesota, and the 48th largest in the United States...

 and St. Paul

Saint Paul, Minnesota

Saint Paul is the capital and second-most populous city of the U.S. state of Minnesota. The city lies mostly on the east bank of the Mississippi River in the area surrounding its point of confluence with the Minnesota River, and adjoins Minneapolis, the state's largest city...

 in 2000, and the Lumen Gentium Award from St. John's Preparatory School in 2004.

The news program 60 Minutes

60 Minutes

60 Minutes is an American television news magazine, which has run on CBS since 1968. The program was created by producer Don Hewitt who set it apart by using a unique style of reporter-centered investigation....

 conducted an investigation into the death of Fr. Kaiser, which put pressure on the international community to solve the mystery of how he died. The Kenyan government reopened the inquest into Fr. Kaiser’s death at the request of the Kenyan Episcopal Conference

Episcopal Conference

In the Roman Catholic Church, an Episcopal Conference, Conference of Bishops, or National Conference of Bishops is an official assembly of all the bishops of a given territory...

. The inquest ended on June 12, 2007, after hearing from 111 witnesses. The presiding magistrate, Maureen Odero, said on August 1, 2007 that Kaiser was murdered, ruled that the "Suicide Theory" was based on a pre-conceived notion, but stated that "she could not — on the basis of evidence tabled before her in the inquest — point out with certainty who the priest’s killers were".

The Rugged Priest

The Rugged Priest is a 2011 film shot by Cinematic Africa Films that tells the story of his life in Kenya. It's release date is 4th March 2011, at the Numetro Cinemas in Nairobi.

External links

• http://www.johnkaiser.net/
• http://johnkaiser.blogspot.com/
• http://www.kofc1376.org/kaiser.htm
• St. Louis Riverfront Times examines death of Father Kaiser
• Tony Barnicle writes about his time in Seminary with Father Kaiser
• Article and Editorial from the Saint Louis University News, Fr. Kaiser's alma mater, reporting his murder.