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Controversial Kenyan televangelist Gilbert Deya, who claimed he created miraculous pregnancies, has died in a road crash.<\/p>\n
Police told local media that Deya died on the spot on Tuesday evening after his vehicle was involved in an accident with a university bus and another vehicle near the town of Kisumu in western Kenya.<\/p>\n
At least 30 other people were reportedly injured, including a person identified as his wife and a passenger in his vehicle, and 15 students in the bus.<\/p>\n
Deya, who ran a church in London, rose to infamy in the early 2000s, following his claim that he could help infertile couples conceive “miracle” babies through prayer.<\/p>\n
Investigations later linked his church to an alleged child-trafficking ring, leading to his arrest and extradition from the UK eight years ago after a decade-long legal battle.<\/p>\n
He was acquitted of the charges in 2023 due to insufficient evidence.<\/p>\n
On Wednesday, Siaya County Governor James Orengo said he had learnt with “deep sorrow and regret of the passing on of Bishop Gilbert Deya”.<\/p>\n
He confirmed that the “horrific” road accident had involved a vehicle belonging to the county.<\/p>\n
Photos shared online showed the mangled wreckage of one of the vehicles, which was completely shattered in the accident.<\/p>\n
A former stonemason-turned evangelist, Deya moved from Kenya to London in the mid-1990s, where he founded Gilbert Deya Ministries, a registered charity with branches across the UK and Africa.<\/p>\n
He was known for his charismatic preaching style and claimed to have been consecrated as an archbishop by a US evangelist in 1992.<\/p>\n
His ministries later faced multiple investigations by the UK authorities for alleged mismanagement and legal violations, including selling olive oil which were falsely claiming to have healing properties.<\/p>\n
He was once described by UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy, then an MP, as a “modern-day snake-oil salesman who has conned and betrayed his vulnerable congregation”.<\/p>\n
At his church, desperate women, some past their menopause and others who were unable to conceive, would be convinced that they would become pregnant through prayer.<\/p>\n
But the babies were always “delivered” in backstreet clinics in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi. The prosecution said the babies were stolen from poor Kenyan families.<\/p>\n
In 2011, his then wife Mary Deya was jailed after being found guilty of stealing a baby from the main referral hospital in Nairobi and falsely stating she had given birth to the baby.<\/p>\n
Deya would later tell a court that they had divorced after she had been charged, saying she had “tarnished” his name.<\/p>\n
Recent videos from the YouTube page of Gilbert Deya Ministries appear to show him announcing that he has a new wife, Diana Deya.<\/p>\n
When the televangelist was asked in a BBC investigation in 2014 how the alleged “miracle” children had different DNA to that of their alleged parents, he said it was “beyond human imagination”.<\/p>\n
“It is not something I can say. I can explain because they are of God and things of God cannot be explained by a human being,” he said.<\/p>\n
After his acquittal in 2023, Deya continued with his religious outreach programmes until his death, reportedly at 72.<\/p>\n