Police say a Woodward woman now faces a first-degree murder charge in a case that shook Iowa’s real estate community and went unsolved for nearly 15 years.
WEST DES MOINES, IA — West Des Moines police have arrested a 53-year-old woman in the 2011 shooting death of realtor Ashley Okland, saying the long-unsolved killing at a model townhome open house has now led to a first-degree murder charge nearly 15 years after the attack.
The arrest matters far beyond one courtroom because Ashley Okland’s killing had become one of central Iowa’s most haunting cold cases, remembered by investigators, the real estate industry and a family that said hope had nearly run out. Kristin Ramsey, of Woodward, has been indicted by a Dallas County grand jury and booked into the Dallas County Jail. Police and prosecutors have released only limited details, saying they do not want to damage the court process, so the public still does not know what evidence led to the arrest or what motive investigators believe was behind the killing.
Okland was 27 on April 8, 2011, when she was working an open house at a model townhome in West Des Moines. Police have said the call came in around 2 p.m. that Friday afternoon after a disturbance was heard at the property. Officers and medics responded and found Okland with two gunshot wounds inside the home. She later died, leaving detectives with a broad daylight homicide in a public-facing business setting and few answers to give a stunned family or community. For years, the case stood out because of where it happened and how quickly word spread through the metro area. On March 17, investigators arrested Ramsey, and by the next day officials announced that a grand jury had returned a true bill charging her with first-degree murder. Dallas County Attorney Matt Schultz said only that the indictment followed the presentation of evidence to the grand jury. West Des Moines Assistant Police Chief Jody Hayes said the arrest was significant, but added that investigators were not finished.
Even with the charge filed, many of the facts that usually shape a murder case remain unknown in public. Authorities have not described a suspected motive, have not laid out a clear timeline of contact between Ramsey and Okland, and have not explained what new development broke open a case that had resisted solution for so long. Officials have said they do not expect additional arrests, but they have also stressed that the investigation remains active. Ramsey, who was 38 at the time of the killing and is now 53, is being held on a $2 million cash-only bond. At the news conference announcing the arrest, family members spoke in plain, careful terms about the years that passed without answers. Okland’s sister, Brittany Bruce, said that Friday afternoon felt both distant and immediate, telling reporters that the family had at times lost hope that justice would come. Her brother, Josh Okland, said the day of the arrest was one the family had imagined for years. Their remarks brought the focus back to the victim after a week of legal filings and sparse official statements.
The case has held unusual weight in Iowa because Ashley Okland’s death did not fade from public memory the way many old cases do. Investigators spent years revisiting the file, and public reports before the arrest said police had interviewed hundreds of people and worked through more than 1,000 leads. The case drew repeated anniversary coverage, community vigils and continuing pleas for information. In earlier public updates, detectives said new tips still arrived each year, a sign that the killing remained fixed in the minds of local residents. Okland’s family also kept her name in view through memorial efforts, including a playground in her honor at Ewing Park. The broader state push to revisit unsolved killings added new attention as Iowa’s cold case work expanded in recent years. That background helps explain why the arrest landed with such force: this was not simply an old file reopened, but a case that had come to symbolize a long wait for answers in a city that had never fully absorbed the randomness and violence of the crime. Hayes said the murder sent shockwaves through the state and haunted the real estate community.
The legal fight is now moving on two tracks, one over Ramsey’s custody status and another over the evidence investigators want to review. Defense attorneys have asked a judge to reduce the $2 million bond, arguing in court filings that the amount is excessive and unconstitutional because Ramsey has been declared indigent and cannot afford it. They have proposed strict release conditions, including monitoring and surrender of her passport. In a separate filing, the defense has challenged a search warrant aimed at Ramsey’s cellphone and other electronic devices. Her lawyers argue the warrant lacks probable cause for a crime committed nearly 15 years ago and says the devices now sought did not exist at the time of the 2011 killing in the form investigators are trying to search. Prosecutors, for their part, have not yet publicly responded in detail to either filing and have not disclosed the evidence presented to the grand jury. That means the next major developments are likely to come not from police briefings but from courtroom rulings and future filings that begin to show how the state intends to prove its case.
There is also a striking human layer to the arrest that has deepened public interest. Ramsey reportedly worked at the time for Rottlund Homes, the company connected to the development where Okland was killed, and at least one former supervisor said he was shocked by the allegation. Steven Kahn, identified in national reporting as Ramsey’s then-boss, said he saw nothing in her work life that made him suspect she could be tied to the crime. He said he even sat near Ramsey at Okland’s funeral, a detail that underscored how hidden the case’s path may have been if the charge holds up in court. Police have not publicly explained what relationship, if any, existed between the two women beyond the work setting around the model home. That gap leaves one of the story’s most basic questions unresolved. For now, what the public has is a name, a charge, a bond amount and a small set of comments from officials and relatives. What it does not yet have is the narrative of why prosecutors believe Ashley Okland was killed, or the evidence they say ties Ramsey to a crime that scarred West Des Moines for nearly 15 years.
The case now stands at a turning point: Ramsey remains jailed, the murder charge is pending, and the next milestones are expected to come through court action on bond and evidence issues as prosecutors begin laying out more of the case in the weeks ahead.
Author note: Last updated March 24, 2026.