NAIROBI: Gunmen killed an imam and three others in a hail of bullets in the Kenyan port city of Mombasa, a year after the imam’s predecessor was killed in the same manner and on the same road and nearly the same spot.

The killings triggered street violence by youth on Friday who blamed police for the homicides, and four more people were killed in the mayhem.

The cleric’s supporters alleged that the shooting death late Thursday of Sheik Ibrahim Ismael was a reprisal by Kenyan security forces for the Sept. 21 attack on Nairobi’s Westgate Mall that killed more than 60 people. Somalia's extremist group, Al-Shabab, claimed responsibility for the attack.

Ismael’s predecessor at the Masjid Musa Mosque, who was gunned down in August 2012, had been accused of aiding Al-Shabab, including recruiting youth for the group.

“While it’s possible the timing is linked, the pattern of targeted killings and disappearances in Mombasa long predates Westgate,” Leslie Lefkow, an Africa researcher at Human Rights Watch said.

The dark four-door car that Ismael was riding in was riddled by bullets. People gathered around the car, taking photographs and staring at the bodies as weeping relatives of the dead approached.

Young men on Friday partly burned the Salvation Army Church and put burning tires on the road. Police carrying assault rifles came to the scene as smoke poured from the compound. Police fired into the air and lobbed tear gas. Kenya’s Red Cross said four people were killed in the rioting, including at least one with gunshot wounds.

Supporters who had gathered around the scene of Ismael’s assassination Thursday blamed Kenyan police for the deaths, saying the killings were payback for the Westgate Mall attack in Nairobi.

“If we take up arms we are terrorists, if we don’t we get killed ... what are we supposed to do when they are killing us. The police are killing us,” said Sheik Abubaker Shariff Ahmed also known as Makaburi, who has been sanctioned by the United Nations and the US for alleged links to Al-Shabab.