One dead, one in police custody after killing in Kansas City home Saturday
Update: Police on Monday identified the victim as 22-year-old Maije Benson.
One person is in police custody after a woman died in a home near 12th and Olive streets Saturday morning.
Officers were called to the home around 11 a.m. Saturday for a disturbance, said Kansas City Police Department Spokesman Cpt. David Jackson.
When officers arrived, Jackson said, they found a woman bleeding profusely. She was pronounced dead when an ambulance arrived on scene.
By Saturday afternoon, Jackson said, police had arrested a person of interest.
The homicide is the 151st in Kansas City this year according to data kept by The Star which includes fatal police shootings. There had been 115 by this time last year.
Kansas City is just four killings away from reaching the city’s record number of killings in a single year. There were 155 homicides, including four police shootings, in 2017.
“It’s tragic, it’s frustrating,” Jackson said about the yearly homicide count. “For every homicide there is a victim’s family behind it. It’s traumatic for the neighborhood. It’s traumatic for the family. It’s traumatic for police and the city and it’s got to stop.”
Rosilyn Temple, executive director of Kansas City Mothers in Charge, stood outside the home where Saturday’s homicide occurred.
She has responded to homicides across the city since her son was killed in 2013. Temple said the Kansas City community needs to work with police to address the homicide rate.
“We’ve really got to address a lot of the issues that we’re dealing with and this should be our protest,” Temple said.
Police are asking anyone with information about Saturday’s killing to call the TIPS hotline at 816-474-8477.
This story was originally published October 3, 2020 at 12:35 PM.
