An American missionary who had escaped justice in Kenya after sexually abusing minors in an orphanage, has finally been handed a 15 year-jail sentence in the United States.

Even last minute apology by the ‘devout Christian missionary,’  could not deter Judge Edward G. Smith from describing Gregory Dow as “a missionary from hell.”

The jailing of Dow has put Kenya’s ability and willingness to take action against foreign missionaries who sexually abused female minors into disrepute.

Questions have also emerged on how Dow managed to evade justice in Kenya, and went as far as leaving the country, despite various reports and protests from the local residents to the authorities about his wayward habit.

It took the USA’s Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) to launch investigations into the conduct of Dow after receiving a tip from a Kenyan, Margaret Ruto, who was living in the USA at the time.

“The defendant’s wife even transported the victims to a medical clinic to have birth control devices implanted into their arms, which allowed Dow to perpetrate his crimes without fear of impregnating his victims,” the US attorney’s office said in a statement after Dow was sentenced last week.

The court as well ordered him to pay $ 16, 000 (Sh1,744,000) in restitution for engaging in illicit sexual conduct in a foreign country.

After investigations, FBI confirmed that Dow had sexually abused at least four teenagers between 2013 and 2017.

“Two of the girls were as young as 11 years old when they began being abused by Dow,” detectives said.

Dow and his wife Mary Rose had in 2008 settled in Boito, Bomet county, where they started the Dow Family Children’s Home. 

But in 2017, Dow fled Kenya never to come back after an arrest warrant was issued against him over claims he was sexually assaulting children under his care.

After Dow left Kenya, his wife tried to flee in September 2017 but was arrested by the police and charged with cruelty to children, she was released on bond but later fled the country leaving the orphanage behind.

The news of Dow’s jailing was received with exaltation, with Lucia Langat, a grandmothers of one of the abused girls summing up the episode: “I allowed my daughter to take her children to the White man because of poverty.

I do not think any person in this village can ever give their children out to a White man again.”