He left home after one phone call: Kisumu family recounts son’s final hours before fatal stabbing
By Viola Kosome, July 13, 2026When 31-year-old Dickson Odiwuor left home on Sunday morning, it seemed like any other day.
He had just received a phone call. Curious, he asked the caller why he was needed so early. The response was simple: “Come now, there is some job that we have got.”
He quickly washed his face, stepped into the house to change his clothes, picked up his motorcycle, and rode away. It was the last time his parents would see him alive.
Now, inside their grieving home in Kapuothe within the Nyalenda area, his mother, Mary Auma, struggles to come to terms with the devastating silence left behind by a son she says was her greatest source of support.
“My son used to buy my blood pressure medicine and would greet me every morning before leaving home. I kept telling him to leave that bouncer job and stay away from politics, but he never listened. He was sleeping peacefully before that phone call came,” she said, her voice breaking with emotion.
Auma says she never imagined that a single call would end her son’s life.
The tragedy has reopened wounds that had barely begun to heal. Just two years ago, another of her sons was killed by a crocodile, leaving behind three children.
Now Dickson has also died, leaving behind a young son.
“I now have two widows in my family. My other son died in a crocodile attack, and now Dickson is gone too. I don’t know how much more pain a mother can bear,” She said.
Her husband, Joseph Oduogo, recalls their final conversation with painful clarity.
Father given Ksh50
That Sunday morning, he was preparing to attend church when Dickson handed him Ksh50 to help with transport and the church offering.
“I left everyone alive. Nothing looked unusual. He gave me Ksh50, and I went to church,” Oduogo said
Hours later, he returned home to find his wife sobbing uncontrollably.
“I asked her what had happened, but she could not speak. When I asked again and again, she finally told me to go to Nightingale Hospital,” he said.
At around 6:30 p.m., doctors delivered the heartbreaking news.
“They told me my son had been stabbed twice in the chest. I found many of my relatives there. My son was lying on the mortuary table facing upwards. I cried because I could not believe he was gone,” he said.
Even in the midst of grief, another burden awaited the family.
Oduogo says he was asked to pay Ksh8,000 for admission of the body into the private mortuary, money he did not have.
“I requested that his body be transferred to a public mortuary because I could not raise the money,” he said.
He later reported the incident to the police and is now appealing to the government to support the family with funeral and mortuary expenses as investigations continue.
“We are asking the government to help us with the mortuary bill and funeral expenses because we are overwhelmed,” he said.
The grieving parents also made an emotional appeal to political leaders, urging them to stop involving young people in violent political activities that continue to claim innocent lives.
“Please stop misusing our children for politics. No parent should have to bury a child because of political violence,” he said.
As relatives continue to stream into the family’s home to offer condolences, Dickson’s young son is among those left behind to grow up without a father.
For Mary Auma and Joseph Oduogo, the future now feels painfully uncertain.
The son who ensured his mother’s medication was bought, drove his father to hospital when needed, and greeted his parents every morning is gone.
In his place are unanswered questions, unbearable grief, and a family hoping that justice will not only be promised, but delivered.