Artist shot dead in Nairobi

Police in Nairboi said the killing was not robbery-related

A Kenyan artist of Polish extraction has been shot dead in a Nairobi suburb 60 years after an infamous murder in the white community.

Tonio Trzebinski, 41, was killed with a single bullet to the heart while driving in the outlying Nairobi suburb of Karen-Langata.

The artist, of Polish extraction, was a member of a well-known aristocrat family and one of Kenya's most prominent painters.

Last year his mother, Errol Trzebinski, published a book about the 1941 murder of the Earl of Erroll, which was made into the film White Mischief.

Accomplished artist

In the book she claimed Lord Erroll was murdered by British intelligence because he was a Nazi sympathiser.

Mr Trzebinski studied at the Slade School of Art and the Chelsea School of Art in London and has exhibited in Kenya, Sicily and the UK.

Police reported that Mr Trzebinski's car had not been stolen and his wallet, with more than £200 inside, was found on his body.

The Daily Telegraph reported Inspector Jonah Kutto as saying: "It has nothing to do with a robbery gone wrong.

"Tonio must have recognised his killer.

"The deceased was lying 10 metres behind the car.

'Shot through the heart'

"He had been shot under the arm, through the heart."

The killing took place on Tuesday just over a mile from where Lord Erroll was murdered in 1941.

Police have not commented on suggestions that the two murders might in some way be linked.

Mr Trzebinski was married to Anna Cunningham-Reid, a relative of Lord Delamare, another well-known figure in Kenya.

He leaves two children.