St. Paul homicide victims identified

St. Paul police have identified the victims of a double-homicide last weekend on the city's East Side.

Roberto Manriquez, 32, and Tomas Reyes-Mojica, 29, both recent arrivals to St. Paul, were found dead Sunday night in their third-floor apartment in the 1300 block of Arkwright Street. Police believe that the men were killed early Saturday.

Autopsies have been completed, but police are withholding information about how the men died as they continue to investigate, police spokesman Peter Panos said Friday.

A motive has yet to be determined, he said, but the killings were not believed to be random.

Carmen Rodriguez, a neighbor, said earlier this week that she had been told by a visitor who knocked on her door Sunday morning that there had been a group of people drinking in the men's apartment Friday night. The visitor said he was looking for a friend who lived there because the friend often got sick when he drank, she said.

The bodies were discovered by officers after police were called about 7 p.m. Sunday.

Panos said Friday that investigators were working to determine how the victims ended up in St. Paul, where they may have been working and who else they may have known. Both men were believed to be recent immigrants from Mexico, he said.

Car was in water a long time

Also Friday, police identified the woman whose body was found in a car pulled from the Mississippi River near Harriet Island two weeks ago.

She was Kathleen M. Spangenberg, 60, of St. Paul, Panos said.

Her body was discovered after workers came upon her vehicle while dredging the river as part of a shoreline stabilization project.

Panos said foul play was not suspected. The vehicle was recovered near the site of a former parking lot, and it appeared to have been in the water for a long time.