Discovery of body in Government Hill apartment prompts Anchorage’s latest homicide investigation

Anchorage police said the discovery of a dead woman at an apartment in the Government Hill neighborhood Sunday night is being investigated as a homicide.

In updated statement Monday afternoon, the Anchorage Police Department said a preliminary investigation found that a family member was returning home and found the woman's body in the living room.

"There were other family members inside the apartment," the statement says. "They were not injured and were in another room in the apartment."

Police dispatchers first got a call about the woman inside an apartment in the 900 block of Richardson Vista Road at 11:34 p.m. Sunday. Responding officers found her body and quickly called in homicide detectives.

Detectives know how the woman died, but they're not releasing those details at this time due to an ongoing investigation.

Police spokesperson MJ Thim said detectives are questioning multiple people, including family members who were inside the apartment. Thim said APD is not releasing suspect information.

Thim said police are certain the homicide is an isolated incident, much like the other violent crimes in Alaska's largest city over the past couple weeks. Evidence collection and interviews indicate everyone knew each other in the Government Hill death, he said.

Last week, two men were trying to enter a home off Jewel Lake Road when a person living there shot one of them, police said. Both men tried to run away; the injured man was found by police lying in a driveway with a gunshot wound to the chest. He died of his injuries at a local hospital.

[Man killed while trying to break into house, Anchorage police say]

Thim said Monday the home invasion and homicide were likely drug-related. He said no other information was available.

So far this year, Anchorage has seen 24 homicides. This time last year the total was 25.