The 'Hessy wa Dandora' killer saga is back on the Kenyan internet and people are wondering what's going on

Any keen X (formerly Twitter) user will have noticed, at least by now, that there is a sudden - and unexplained - resurgence of Hessy wa Dandora sagas which have seen the platform’s users litter the timeline with various tales of some of the most hardcore teen delinquents ever.

Over five years ago, crime busters going by several nicknames such as 'Hessy wa Dandora', 'Hessy wa Kayole' etc jammed the headlines for their no-nonsense, and often deadly, approach to teen thugs in some of Nairobi's most notorious slums.

The dreaded police killer squads, collectively known as Hessy, were meticulously organised and purposely outfitted to be mysterious and brutal - gunning down countless criminals in their jurisdictions and publishing their bloody conquests on Facebook.

Back then, they prowled the town ruthlessly ending the life of any trouble maker from Dandora to Mathare, Kayole to Kibera.

These criminals would run entire swathes of the slums they were born and brought up in, running deadly criminal gangs, the most infamous of which was 'Gaza'. 

But after a long lull, the Hessy telenovela is back on X, with many users penning lengthy threads on some of the most notorious victims of the dreaded Hessy era.

Some of the teen thugs who met the wrath of the terrorsome Hessy squads used to go by the nicknames Mwane Sparta, Clea Ady Vybz, Tomaso Galula, King Ilhab, Teddy Wamuthee and Sasha Minaj.

The Hessy drama came to a head after Mwane Sparta, a feared Gaza kingpin, whose girlfriend Clea Ady Vybz had also just been felled, was dramatically shot dead in broad daylight in Ruiru. 

One of the Hessy cops, who by then went by the pseudonym Blackest Widow, detailed Mwane's killing, asking teen thugs to give up or have their brains blown out too.

"Ningependa sana vijana mfunguke macho na muone ukweli wa maneno...Kama Mwane, Teddy, Bramwel, Kush, Mwalimu na wengine wengi wameshaulala..na eti hao ndio walikuwa makingpin mbona uendelee kushika kidungi?...Why run after an early grave?" he posted in December 2017 on one of the Hessy Facebook pages.

"Huyu anajiita mkubwa wenu Kagwanja, ushaimwona mahali mkipanda yutman alibakishwa kwa musu? Hawa ma MP na ma MCA mnasema wanawafund mshaiwaona kwa matanga?"

Mwane's girlfriend Claire Njoki, then dubbed 'Kenya's prettiest gangster', and going by the nickname, Clea Ady Vybz, was also said to have been brutally terrorising Kayole residents before she was dramatically killed by a Hessy killer squad after a robbery gone bad.

On the 'Dandora Crime Free' Facebook page, an anonymous Hessy cop wrote, "Hayawi hayawi huwa Clea Adi Vybz mnakumbuka nkikimpea warning awache wizi na bwanake Mwanii???  Rot in hell stupid woman!"

These tales have captivated X users with many wondering why, all of a sudden, Kenyans were revisiting the Hessy era and what this had to do with anything.

Someone has suggested that the upcoming deployment of Kenyan police officers in Haiti may have something to do with the Hessy threads on X but while the explanation does not make sense, it sure does sound like a good starting point.