A man from Shakopee was charged Monday with fatally shooting a 22-year-old woman in her Richfield home about three weeks ago after he pursued a relationship but she told him she was only interested in friendship.
Jose Luis Lopez Xique, 27, was arrested near his home Thursday in connection with the death of Kayli Grace Arseth and charged in Hennepin County District Court with second-degree murder. Lopez Xique remained jailed in lieu of $2.5 million bail ahead of a Tuesday court appearance. Court records do not list an attorney for him.
“This was a terrible instance of extreme, targeted violence that took Kayli from her loved ones,” Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said in a statement. “My thoughts are with her family during this extraordinarily difficult period. Our office will prosecute Mr. Lopez Xique to protect our community and hold him accountable for his actions.”
Police made a welfare check on Arseth about 9 a.m. on June 17 at her apartment in the 7700 block of Penn Avenue S., according to police. Her family said she had not been heard from since a day earlier and had not reported to work.
Police said they found Arseth dead inside her apartment with a gunshot wound to the head.
“Kayli loved working with children and started babysitting and nannying while still in middle school,” according to her obituary. “More recently, she worked as a behavioral technician, guiding autistic children through their developmental years. ... Just 10 days before her life was taken away, she mentioned she had decided to pursue a degree in developmental psychology at the University of Minnesota.”
While attending Wayzata High School, Arseth was on the swim team and was a pole vaulter on the track and field team, the obituary noted. An older sister, Heather Arseth, was a state champion swimmer for Wayzata High School who competed for the East African nation of Mauritius in the 2012 Olympics in London and the 2016 Games in Rio de Janeiro.
According to the criminal complaint: