ORANGE COUNTY DISTRICT ATTORNEY PRESS RELEASE
Case # C-53262
Date: February 6, 2015
MAN SENTENCED TO DEATH PENALTY FOR RAPE AND STABBING-MURDER OF 22-YEAR-OLD WOMAN OUTSIDE OF BAR IN 1983
*Defendant was previously sentenced to death but the case was overturned on appeal by a federal district judge
SANTA ANA – A man was sentenced today to receive the death penalty for raping and murdering a 22-year-old woman in an alley behind a bar in 1983. The defendant was previously convicted and sentenced to receive the death penalty in this case in 1985. In June 1990, Richard Raymond Ramirez appealed to the California Supreme Court, who affirmed the defendant’s conviction. His conviction was later overturned by the Federal District Court for the Central District of California on writ of habeas corpus.
Ramirez, 55, was found guilty by a jury in the re-trial of this case on May 15, 2013, of one felony count of special circumstances murder in the commission of rape, one felony count of rape, and a sentencing enhancement for the personal use of a deadly weapon. A mistrial was declared in the previous penalty phase of the trial on June 3, 2013. A new jury recommended Ramirez receive the death penalty on Nov. 24, 2014. Continue reading