Peter Poole


Peter Poole was a British-born Kenyan engineer and shop owner. He was the only white in Kenya to be executed for killing an indigenous African person.
On 12 October 1959 he was charged with killing Kamawe Musunge, his houseboy, in Gordon Road, Nairobi. Musunge had been riding a bicycle when Poole's two dogs stopped him. Musunge threw stones at one dog, for which Poole shot him dead with a Luger pistol. Poole was executed on 18 August 1960. At the time Kenya was still under British rule, and the verdict was received negatively by some white settlers in the region.
Poole had emigrated to Kenya from Essex. He owned an electrical shop on Nairobi's Government Road. Poole served in the British Army during the Mau Mau Uprising. He was married with two children.