MINNEAPOLIS — A 38-year-old Minneapolis man is charged after a woman was found dead near a Minneapolis church back in July.
Byron Vinicio Varga Bautista is charged with second-degree murder after prosecutors say he beat a 57-year-old woman and left her body outside a church near Oak Park Avenue North and Penn Avenue North. Police were called to the area in the afternoon of July 14 and found a woman with injuries to her face and upper body.
A medical examiner later identified her cause of death to be blunt force trauma. Court documents say the woman suffered hemorrhaging around her brain, neck and clavicle. Her hyoid bone was also fractured. Investigators later identified the woman to be a 57-year-old resident at a Minneapolis skilled nursing facility.
According to the criminal complaint, witnesses say they saw the woman with a man, later identified as Bautista, on the evening of July 13. Officials obtained video from Metro Transit buses that appeared to show Bautista and the woman travelling through the city and eventually leaving the bus near Penn Avenue North and Olive Avenue North.
Court documents say surveillance videos from surrounding homes in the area captured Bautista and the woman walking toward the church where the woman's body was eventually discovered. Prosecutors say traffic cameras then showed what appeared to be Bautista carrying the woman, and additional videos showed Bautista allegedly going back and forth to the area of the crime, before eventually leaving.
Police were driving around south Minneapolis on Sept. 19 when they spotted a man who fit the description of the suspect. He was arrested and remains in custody. According to court documents, Bautista identified himself in numerous images, but didn't claim to know the victim and said he didn't remember what happened on July 13.
