Two brothers were Saturday October 4, 2025 arrested over the murder of a university don in a dispute over a prolonged land dispute in Mbita, Homa Bay County

The two were arrested in Mbita area after days of their hunt for the killing of their brother Prof. Thomas Tonny Onyango Mboya, 56 on September 30, 2025.

Police identified them as Evans Owuor Orwa, 40 and Michael Odhiambo Odero, 49. Police said they were looking for three more suspects over the murder of Prof Mboya.

The three are expected in court on Monday October 6, police said adding they will face murder charges.

Prof Mboya who was an Associate Professor and Director of the School of Mathematics and Statistics at the Technical University of Kenya (TUK), was attacked while erecting beacons on the disputed parcel of land, police said.

The police said his father who was identified as Wilson Onyango Opanga was also attacked and left with serious injuries in the drama.

The assailants are brothers to the late don, police claimed adding they are on the run.

According to witnesses, one of the assailants who had allegedly encroached and built on the contested property, became enraged after a court ruling directed him to demolish his structures.

Instead of complying, he reportedly stormed the site armed with a panga, beheading Prof. Mboya before turning on his father.

Mboya’s father suffered deep panga cuts during the attack and was rushed to hospital where he is fighting for his life at a hospital in Homa Bay County, police said.

The suspects fled the scene after residents raised alarm, narrowly escaping a mob that pursued them.

Nyanza Regional head of Directorate of Criminal Investigations George Mutonya said the late professor was in the company of his father and were waiting for police and the area chief to arrive and help in executing the order when they were attacked.

“By the time police arrived at the scene, the assailants had escaped but we are pursuing them by all means,” said Mutonya.

He said the assailants ambushed the brother killing him and left the old man with injuries.

His friends and colleagues mourned him as a good man.

Prof. Mboya was widely respected in academic circles. Born in 1970, he completed his O-Level education (KCE) at Kokuro Secondary School in 1987 before joining Homa Bay High School for his A-Level studies in 1989. He later pursued a Bachelor of Education (Science) degree at Egerton University, graduating in 1993.

In 1994, he began his teaching career under the Teachers Service Commission (TSC). Three years later, he took study leave to pursue a Master of Science degree in Mathematics at the University of Nairobi, graduating in 1999.

Afterward, he returned to teaching before joining the Catholic University of Eastern Africa (CUEA) in 2002 as a lecturer. In 2005, he proceeded to the United Kingdom, where he earned his PhD in Inverse and Ill-posed Problems from the University of Leeds in 2008.

Between 2009 and 2012, he resumed teaching at CUEA before moving to the Technical University of Kenya in March 2012 as a Senior Lecturer and Chair of the Department of Statistics and Computational Mathematics.

From February 2013 to January 2016, he served as the Head of the Department of Industrial and Engineering Mathematics.