Desirae Argueta-Joj’s death led to a second-degree murder conviction and a sentence prosecutors say was too low.
MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. — Desirae Brown Argueta-Joj was a 42-year-old mother of nine when she was killed inside a north Minneapolis apartment last fall, a death that has now resulted in a 128-month prison sentence for the man who shot her.
Her name entered the criminal record through the final minutes of her life, but a funeral-home notice supplies a broader identity. Argueta-Joj was born Jan. 30, 1983, in Chicago to Lisa L. Brown and Juan Ocampo. The obituary lists nine children by name and records her death on Nov. 5, 2025. Those dates establish that she was 42, despite later reports that described her as 43. The correction is minor in legal terms but important in a case where much of the public narrative has come from statements made by the man convicted of killing her.
Raymond Jones, 66, was sentenced Sept. 11 to 128 months in prison after a judge found him guilty of second-degree unintentional murder. Jones had waived his right to a jury, placing both the factual findings and the verdict in the judge’s hands. The court acquitted him of intentional second-degree murder, the more serious theory prosecutors pursued. The Hennepin County Attorney’s Office then sought 180 months on the conviction that remained. The judge chose the low end of the presumptive range instead, leaving prosecutors openly dissatisfied with both the verdict and the punishment.
The case began in Jones’ apartment in the 2600 block of West Broadway Avenue on Nov. 5, 2025. Officers responding there found Argueta-Joj on the floor between a table and a couch, according to reporting based on court documents. A folding pocketknife was in her hand. She had been shot in the chest and was dead when authorities arrived. The county attorney’s office said the shot was fired at contact range and passed through her heart. That close-range evidence later became central to prosecutors’ argument that the shooting was intentional rather than an accidental discharge during a struggle.
Jones himself summoned police. His account changed as investigators questioned him. Court records described in published reports say he first told authorities that Argueta-Joj had a gun and that it fired while they struggled. He later acknowledged that the weapon was his .45-caliber handgun and that he pulled the trigger, while continuing to describe the shooting as occurring during a confrontation. Officers reported finding no visible injuries, marks or scratches on Jones. Prosecutors pointed to that lack of defensive injury as one fact that did not fit the version of a violent fight he gave investigators.
The dispute, by Jones’ own account, involved $30. He told investigators that he met Argueta-Joj earlier in the day and planned to pay her for sex. They went to his apartment, where he said the encounter did not work out. When she got up to leave, he noticed that the $30 was missing and stopped her. Jones said Argueta-Joj then pulled a knife. Asked why he did not simply let her go, he answered that she had his $30. He said the struggle involving the gun followed. Prosecutors treated that explanation not as a justification but as evidence of how a small financial dispute escalated into a fatal confrontation.
The legal result did not fully adopt either side’s public description of what happened. Prosecutors argued Jones deliberately fired the gun at extremely close range and should be convicted of intentional second-degree murder. Jones’ account emphasized a struggle and an unintended shot. After hearing the evidence without a jury, the judge rejected the intentional-murder count but found Jones guilty of unintentional second-degree murder. Minnesota law allows that form of second-degree murder when a person causes a death without an intent to kill while committing or attempting to commit a qualifying felony. The statute authorizes up to 40 years in prison, though sentencing guidelines typically determine a much smaller presumptive range in an individual case.
That distinction shaped the Sept. 11 hearing. The county attorney’s office said 180 months was the highest presumptive sentence available on Jones’ conviction and asked the judge to impose it. The judge selected 128 months, which the office described as the lowest presumptive term. In ordinary terms, the difference was 52 months. Jones therefore received a sentence of 10 years and eight months rather than the 15 years prosecutors requested. The office did not describe the sentence as an unlawful departure; its criticism was that the judge chose the bottom of the lawful presumptive range after already declining to convict Jones of intentional murder.
Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty responded with a statement that returned attention to Argueta-Joj. She said her thoughts were with the woman’s loved ones and said Argueta-Joj should still be alive. Moriarty argued that Jones had not taken responsibility and said the shooting arose from the $30 dispute. She also objected to what she described as blame being placed on the victim during the case. Her statement did not challenge the court’s authority to decide the charges or the sentence; it made clear that prosecutors believed both outcomes understated Jones’ culpability.
The record also contains details that do not fit neatly into the prosecutor’s criticism. Reporting based on court documents says Jones cooperated with police at the scene and appeared remorseful, and that he remained remorseful during the trial. Remorse and legal responsibility are different questions. A person can express regret while disputing intent or describing conduct as accidental. Likewise, cooperation after a shooting does not decide whether the shooting itself was intentional. The judge’s mixed verdict reflects that separation: Jones was held criminally responsible for causing Argueta-Joj’s death, while the court was not persuaded beyond a reasonable doubt on the intentional-murder charge.
The case has also produced errors as it moved through secondary coverage. Some reports said a jury convicted Jones and acquitted him on the intentional count. The Hennepin County Attorney’s Office says the opposite procedural fact: Jones waived a jury and chose a court trial, meaning the judge made the findings. Some reports gave Argueta-Joj’s age as 43, while her funeral-home record shows she was 42. Those discrepancies do not change the central outcome, but they matter because they can distort how readers understand a case that turned on a judge’s assessment of evidence rather than a jury’s deliberations.
There is no dispute in the reviewed sources about the central physical event. Argueta-Joj died from a gunshot fired from Jones’ handgun inside his apartment, and Jones was convicted of second-degree unintentional murder for causing her death. The dispute at trial concerned his intent and the circumstances surrounding the shot. Prosecutors believed the evidence proved intentional murder; the judge did not. At sentencing, prosecutors urged the highest presumptive term; the judge imposed the lowest. Those two judicial decisions define the present legal status of the case.
For Argueta-Joj’s family, the sentence closes one stage of a case that began with a fatal encounter and then became a debate over intent, responsibility and punishment. Her obituary records the family ties that the criminal filings do not: nine children, two parents and a life that began in Chicago decades before her death in Minneapolis. The court record will continue to identify her as the victim in case 27-CR-25-28272, but the public records reviewed for this story also show a person whose life cannot be reduced to the $30 at the center of the dispute.
As of Oct. 21, the latest authoritative update located was the Hennepin County Attorney’s Sept. 11 sentencing announcement. It states that Jones was sentenced to 128 months after the bench-trial conviction and does not report any later change to the judgment. No subsequent ruling altering the conviction or prison term was identified in the reviewed material.
Author note: Last updated October 21, 2026.