NAIROBI, March 27, 2008 (AFP) - Fourteen members of a banned sect linked to a string of murders and beheadings were arrrested Thursday as they were apparently taking an illegal oath, police said.

The suspects, members of the Mungiki sect, were seized in a house in the Rift Valley provincial capital of Nakuru, as six of their leaders escaped through a window.

'We suspect that they were taking an oath with an intention to commit a crime,' said Nakuru police commander Francis Nyamatari.

Police also recovered paraphernalia that included tobacco snuff, roasted meat, goat skin, bones, banana leaves, whips, containers with soil, a Bible and innerwear in a basin.

Once a religious group of dreadlocked youths who embraced traditional rituals, authorities say the Mungiki sect has evolved into a ruthless gang blamed for criminal activities that include extortion and murder.

Since March, the sect has been blamed for murdering dozens of people, including 14 beheadings, mainly in slum districts of the capital Nairobi and in central Kenya.

Police have responded with a heavy-handed crackdown, killing scores of Mungiki adherents.

The sect, mainly drawn from President Mwai Kibaki's Kikuyu tribe, was accused of carrying out some of the killings that occurred during violence that claimed at least 1,500 lives after disputed elections on December 27.