John Matara has dropped a bombshell in the Starlet Wahu murder trial. The man accused of stabbing the socialite to death inside a South B Airbnb now says the night she died began as a filmed sex session for her OnlyFans account, an account he claims he helped run.
He told the High Court he first found her on a dating site for paid sex.
Testifying before Justice Alexander Muteti on Thursday, October 8, 2026, Matara said he came across Wahu on bedescorts.com around July or August 2023. The site, he said, is where commercial sex workers advertise to clients. He liked what he saw, took the number on her advert and contacted her.
She sent him nude photographs on WhatsApp. He told the court that was “the norm.” She quoted him KSh35,000 for a night. Their first meeting was at Sankara Hotel in Westlands. He paid the full amount. They drank, had sex and parted the next day.
They met again at the same hotel in December 2023. That time he paid only KSh20,000 and left a balance of KSh15,000. He said the arrangement had by then grown into something closer.
Then came the OnlyFans claim.
Matara told the court he and Wahu used to record themselves during sex and later watch the videos together on television. He said he was “actually getting addicted to it.” He further claimed she ran an OnlyFans account where she posted naked pictures, and that he edited, uploaded and managed the content because of his skills in graphic design and computer programming. He said he had backend access to the account.
On January 3, 2024, he booked Unit Y32 at Papino Apartments in South B through Jiji.co.ke. He checked in at about 5pm, paid KSh3,200 and signed the visitors’ book. Wahu arrived around 8pm in a red Uber. He paid her KSh350 fare. They bought a 750ml bottle of whisky.
Inside the apartment, he said, she again asked him to set a phone to record them. They took an HIV test. Both results were negative. She wanted unprotected sex. He insisted on condoms. They had sex. The recording, he claimed, stayed on a phone later seized by investigators.
The fight started after the sex.
Matara said Wahu demanded KSh50,000, the outstanding KSh15,000 plus KSh35,000 for that night. According to his account she turned abusive and told him: “You poor dog, you rotten ct, you M******, you have to pay me the full amount or no one will get out of this room alive.”
He sent KSh20,000 by M-Pesa and promised the rest the next morning. He said he was expecting KSh100,000 from an app development job. The row cooled. He went to the bathroom.
When he came back, he said, she was standing between the bed and the cabinet with one hand behind her back. He moved to hug her. She pushed him onto the bed. He lay down and closed his eyes, thinking they were about to continue.
Then, he told the court, he felt sharp pains in his thighs. “She stabbed me multiple times. I folded my hands on my chest so as to cover myself. I was bleeding profusely. There was blood all over. Then I realised she was holding a knife. I never at any moment handled that knife.”
He said he rolled off the bed, hit his head, tried to grab the blade and cut his palms, then forced his way past her. Both of them were covered in blood. She slipped. He grabbed his clothes, his phone and a towel, and fled.
As he left, he claimed, she was still alive, shouting for her money and warning he would not get out without payment.
He collapsed at a clinic, was moved to Mbagathi Hospital, and told staff he had been stabbed by a woman he considered his girlfriend. Police later handcuffed him in the ward. He has been in custody for about two years and nine months.
“I left the deceased alive. I did not injure or harm the deceased at any moment,” he told the court. “I am still shocked that Starlet passed away.”
That story collides with what investigators have already put before the same court. Wahu was found dead in the early hours of January 4, 2024, lying in a pool of blood inside the apartment Matara had booked, with multiple stab wounds.
Officers recovered a kitchen knife, two phones, a used HIV testing kit, a blood-stained white towel, condoms, eight syringes and women’s undergarments. CCTV captured a man running from the unit. The prosecution has called 18 witnesses. DNA evidence has been said to link Matara and Wahu to items at the scene.
His dating-site confession, his OnlyFans claim and his insistence that she held the knife are now the heart of his defence. They remain his word, still to be tested in cross-examination. The case returns to court on December 16, 2026.
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