The mother of teenager Sylvester Muigai Ndung’u found his body in a mortuary in the central Kenyan town of Nanyuki two days after he went missing.
Warning: This article contains details some readers may find upsetting.
The 17-year-old was killed on Tuesday during clashes between police and demonstrators protesting a US plan to build an Ebola quarantine centre at a nearby military base.
Lucy Kagure had been searching for her son in hospitals and police stations and eventually discovered his body at the mortuary, where he had been listed as an unidentified male.
“When I found him, half of his head had been split open. His clothes were soaked in blood,” she told the BBC.
Witnesses said Muigai had been shot in the head, but a local police commander, Daniel Kitavi, told the BBC that authorities were still awaiting a post-mortem examination to determine the cause of death.
Family members said police officers suggested he may have been killed by a tear-gas canister rather than a bullet.
Kagure said her son had left home on Tuesday to collect his school uniform from his aunt when he became caught up in the unrest.
“The police used too much force,” she said through tears. “Are they not parents too?
“I have struggled to raise that boy as a single mother, earning just 300 Kenyan shillings ($2.30; £1.70) a day doing casual work,” she said.
“I brought him up from nursery school to Form Three, and then they just killed him.”
His family described the teenager as a well-behaved boy who was always willing to help at home.
A local church leader said he had ambitions of becoming a priest.
Muigai is the third person to die during protests against the planned 50-bed quarantine centre.
The isolation unit at Laikipia Air Base is intended for US citizens affected by the current Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The plan has sparked public concern in Kenya over cross-border infection risks and the government’s lack of transparency regarding the treatment centre.
Last month, the High Court ordered that the opening of the facility be halted after a rights group filed a case alleging that it posed “grave and imminent risks” to public health.
Satellite imagery seen by the BBC shows that construction has continued at the airbase despite the court order halting the project.
A US official said last week that the administration was aware of the court case but was “optimistic we can resolve objections.”
Kenya’s President William Ruto defended the plan, saying he had received a request from the US to establish the centre and that refusing the request would be “inhuman.”
He called on Kenyans not to politicise a matter “so serious” as Ebola and urged politicians to avoid “reckless” comments about it.
On Tuesday, demonstrators had planned a peaceful march to deliver a petition calling for the facility to be relocated. However, clashes broke out after police blocked access to the site.
Police used tear gas and water cannons to disperse crowds, while protesters erected roadblocks and lit bonfires across parts of the town.
The Kenya Human Rights Commission, a non-governmental organisation, has accused police of using excessive force, including live ammunition and arbitrary arrests during the demonstrations. Authorities have not responded to those allegations.
But one grieving mother now wants answers.
“I want justice for my boy,” she said.
English 