Two brothers, including the husband of a woman that was fatally shot in the head, were arrested in connection with the shooting on July 1 at the Red Carpet Inn at West U.S. 192 in Kissimmee, the Osceola Sheriff’s Office announced Wednesday.
Kaylan Vega, the 24-year-old husband of the woman whose name has not been released, was arrested on a first-degree murder charge. Kysean Francis, Vega’s brother according to deputies, is waiting to be transferred from the Seminole County Jail, where he was arrested, on charges of accessory after the fact and tampering with evidence.
According to affidavits from an OCSO detective, witnesses heard a woman yelling in what sounded like an argument from Room 212 at the Red Carpet Inn 30-40 minutes before law enforcement arrived at the scene, with one reporting hearing a thud from the same room, and describing the sound as someone falling to the floor between 2 p.m. and 4 p.m.
Osceola deputies arrived at the motel around 5:40 p.m. and heard a man, later identified as Vega, screaming, “My wife, my wife” over and over and telling dispatchers that she had been hurt, the affidavits said. Deputies entered the room and found a female with her face covered in blood from an apparent head injury.
When Vega was questioned at a Sheriff’s West substation, the affidavit said, his “emotional state would not allow him to speak at all.”
Another 911 call by someone identifying himself as “John Blake” and whom detectives said was actually Francis pointed first responders to Room 107.
Surveillance footage showed the victim was last seen heading to a McDonald’s across the street around noon, ordering food before going back to the motel room about 30 minutes later and never left again, according to the affidavits. At 4:22 p.m., Vega and Francis were seen leaving the room with a total of three pieces of luggage with them.
Francis was arrested in Seminole County on Friday, the day after the victim was killed. He then told deputies in an interview that Vega had shot the woman during an argument in which she had brandished a knife, according to the deputy’s affidavits. They then took the gun and some of their belongings and left the hotel, around the time Francis made the phony 911 call, he told investigators.
Francis also said he tossed the gun in a “body of water” near a Walmart Supercenter on North Bass Road.
A press conference meant to announce the arrests on Wednesday was canceled after a relative was unable to appear, said sheriff’s office spokesperson Ruth Monroig in an email.
