In a tragic event on September 30, 2016, 13-year-old Luisito Luis Eduardo Ronquillo, a Black/African American male, lost his life in a south Minneapolis apartment. The incident unfolded in the Wenonah neighborhood, a community near Lake Nokomis not accustomed to such violent occurrences. The Hennepin County Medical Examiner would later confirm that Luisito died from a gunshot wound to the head, ruling his death a homicide.
He was an eighth-grade student at Richfield Middle School.
When police responded to the scene on the 5400 block of 34th Avenue South, they discovered a grim tableau. Inside the apartment, they found the bodies of Luisito, his 10-year-old sister Nahily Ronquillo, and their 39-year-old father, Luis Eduardo Ronquillo Alvarado. The children's mother, Maria Romero, was also found at the location with injuries from the shooting, but she survived the horrific attack.
The investigation into the deaths quickly revealed the incident to be a domestic-related murder-suicide. Authorities determined that Luis Eduardo Ronquillo Alvarado was the sole perpetrator. It was concluded that he shot his two children and their mother before turning the gun on himself, dying from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. As the suspect in the killings was deceased at the scene, no arrests were made, and police assured the public that there was no ongoing threat to the community.
