Ex-boyfriend who set Ugandan athlete on fire D!ES

The man who allegedly set fire to Olympic marathon runner Rebecca Cheptegei last Sunday has also d!ed from injuries he sustained in the fatal attack on the Ugandan athlete

Cheptegei, 33, suffered multiple organ failure last week and tragically passed away in a hospital in Eldoret, Kenya, days after she sustained 80% burns when ex-boyfriend Dickson Ndiema threw petrol on her and set her alight amid a bitter argument.

Ndiema also received considerable burns and was rushed to the same hospital, where Kenyan police said he would be detained once he had recovered enough from his injuries.

But officials at the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital confirmed this morning that Ndiema also succumbed to his injuries late last night.

‘Dickson Ndiema Marangach has died from 30 per cent burns he sustained when he set his girlfriend Rebecca Cheptegei ablaze last week,’ the statement read.

‘The police believe he was burnt by the same petrol he used in setting Rebecca ablaze following a dispute over ownership of land one of them had bought.’

Ndiema’s savage attack on Cheptegei took place on Sunday, September 1.

The pair were heard by neighbours arguing loudly at Cheptegei’s home in Kenya’s western Trans Nzoia County where the athlete had recently moved to be closer to superior Kenyan training facilities.

Ndiema is said to have snapped and doused her with petrol from a jerry can before setting her alight.

Neighbours who heard the commotion came running to discover the Olympian engulfed in flames and tried to extinguish them, to no avail.

The athlete was rushed to the intensive care unit at Eldoret’s Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital in the wake of the attack, with some 80% of her body badly burned.

She was stabilised and there were hopes she could survive the ordeal early last week, but the facility’s acting director Dr Owen Menach confirmed Cheptegei died on Wednesday night after all her organs began to fail one after the other.

Ndiema, whom police named as the prime suspect in Cheptegei’s death – which is being treated as murder – also suffered significant burns in the attack and was set to be arraigned once doctors deemed him healthy enough to be released prior to his reported death.

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