A Navy surface warfare officer has been charged with murder in the death of his wife, Jesse Arguinzoni Olsen, in Fukuoka, Japan, in October.
Lt. Cmdr. Christopher Olsen, currently assigned to Naval Surface Group Southwest, was charged May 7 with unpremeditated murder and obstructing justice during an Article 32 hearing, according to Cmdr. Paul Macapagal, a spokesman for U.S. Naval Forces Japan.
Olsen, 37, was found dead Oct. 28 at a hotel in Fukuoka, roughly 60 miles northwest of Sasebo Naval Base, Japan. The Japan Times reported at the time that police were called to the location for a suspected suicide, but an investigation led military officials to take the dead woman’s husband, Christopher Olsen, into custody.
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Olsen’s family has been actively seeking answers in their loved one’s death, with Olsen’s sister, Dominique Arguinzoni, launching a “Justice for Jesse” campaign in January. In emails sent to members of the media in April, Arguinzoni said that her parents were notified of the death on Oct. 28 but received little support or information in the ongoing investigation into their daughter’s death or their son-in-law.
“There was no in-person visit, no support team, no effort to ensure that they were physically or emotionally able to process the news,” Arguinzoni wrote in a statement to the media April 11. “We were simply told that Jesse was dead — and that her husband, [Lt. Cmdr.] Christopher Olsen, was a person of interest. It would be three agonizing weeks before we were informed of her cause of death.”
The military newspaper Stars and Stripes reported that Olsen was found dead at the hotel with signs of trauma, including bleeding. Arguinzoni told the newspaper that her sister had injuries to her head, including a broken jaw and neckbone. The cause of death, according to court documents, was strangulation and blunt force trauma.
Like preliminary hearings in the U.S. civilian court system, an Article 32 hearing determines whether there is sufficient evidence to refer charges to court-martial. In the case of such a violent crime, the hearing officer will make a recommendation to the Navy Office of Special Trial Counsel, which will decide whether the case should go to trial.
Macapagal said Thursday that the Navy could not comment any further on the case as a result of the ongoing litigation.
“The Navy is committed to ensuring the military justice system is fair and impartial, and the accused is presumed innocent until proven guilty,” Macapagal said in a statement to Military.com.
Jesse and Christopher Olsen both attended the State University of New York at Oswego, where Jesse Olsen studied math and meteorology. She later earned a master’s degree in aerospace science and, like many military spouses, held a variety of jobs as she accompanied her husband to various duty stations, including working as a meteorologist, bookkeeper, museum docent and substitute teacher, according to her LinkedIn and X accounts.
Arguinzoni described her sister as a “remarkably strong woman, full of joy, humor and individuality.” On Wednesday, Arguinzoni sent a statement to Military.com reacting to the charges against Christopher Olsen.
“We’ve lived every day since Jesse’s death in disbelief but not in confusion,” she wrote. “We know what happened, we knew who was responsible, and we knew that justice would not come easily.”
In 2022, Navy Lt. Craig Becker was found guilty of premeditated murder, assault and conduct unbecoming an officer in the death of his wife, Johanna Hove-Becker, 32, who died after falling from their seventh-floor apartment in Belgium in 2015.
According to court documents, Becker drugged his wife with sleeping medications and opioids the day of her death. He was given a life sentence with the possibility of parole and a dismissal from the service.
— Konstantin Toropin contributed to this article.
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