Missing Witness Helped Convict Men and Could Now Free Them

Her words put two Pomona gang members behind bars for life in connection with a 1997 murder rampage that left four dead in a day and cast a shadow of fear over the blue-collar suburb in east Los Angeles County.

Now her words could free them. That is, if she ever shows up for an important hearing today in Pomona Superior Court.

Desiree Ramirez, 18, is the reason that Richard “Sneeks” Aguirre and Michael “Spanky” Guzman have been held in the state prison system with no prospects of ever walking free.

Ramirez was the key eyewitness who tied the men to the Jan. 21, 1997 killings of Stephanie Contreras, 19; Armando Valle, 33; and Fernando Madrigal, 34, at Valle’s home on 7th Street.

At a 1997 preliminary hearing, she testified that she saw Aguirre and Guzman--members of the Pomona 12th Street gang--running from the house, where police later found the victims shot execution-style in the head.

That testimony was the key to their conviction in the following trial, for which Ramirez had disappeared. It also helped authorities secure a conviction against Aguirre in a fourth killing.

But after the jury imposed life sentences, Ramirez emerged from the shadows with a shocking twist: She made it up.

Based on that admission, the case was recently reopened by the 2nd District Court of Appeal, setting up today’s evidentiary hearing before Superior Court Judge David Milton, who presided over the men’s original trial.

“The bottom line is Desiree is the only one linking them to these killings,” said Seymour I. Amster, Aguirre’s appeals attorney. “She was the linchpin for these convictions.”

Milton could order a new trial. And if he doesn’t, the Court of Appeal could order a new trial.

The prosecutor in charge of the case said Wednesday that his star witness seems to have disappeared again. That could leave Aguirre, 22, and Guzman, 21, without the possibility of being freed.

“I’d be surprised if she shows up,” Deputy Dist. Atty. Andrew McMullen said about today’s hearing. “Both sides want her to be in court.”

McMullen said Ramirez was a willing witness who volunteered the killers’ identities when she appeared at a May 1997 preliminary hearing.

She described hearing 10 to 15 shots the night of the killings as she looked out her front door. She said she saw Aguirre and Guzman, whom she knows, and another man running away from a neighboring home where the killings occurred shortly after 10 p.m.

Prosecutors had moved Ramirez to a new home for her own protection but during jury selection for the men’s November 1997 murder trial, she disappeared. Prosecutors say she left because she feared gang retribution for her testimony.

Without the witness available, Milton allowed the prosecutor to read a transcript of Ramirez’s preliminary hearing testimony to the trial jury. The panel took less than two days to convict the men of multiple murder with special circumstances, earning them life sentences. Ramirez’s statements also helped authorities tie Aguirre to the killing of 15-year-old Michael Reed Jr. They were able to match the shell casings in the triple homicide to the Reed killing.

But in November 1998, the neat package began to unravel. Ramirez told a private investigator working for Aguirre’s attorney that there were big problems with her incriminating testimony.

For one, she admitted that shortly before the shootings, she had gotten high by smoking three PCP-laced cigarettes. Although the original jury heard that Ramirez used the drug on the day of the killings, it was unknown how much and how close in time to the incident, defense attorneys now say.

“I did some drugs that night and thought it was them but it wasn’t them,” Ramirez told the detective in a taped interview, adding that she felt “bad because it wasn’t them. . . . I know I made a mistake and hopefully I can fix it.”

Secondly, Ramirez--who later signed the transcript of the interview--admitted that she identified Guzman simply because she disliked him.

But McMullen said that in a meeting with prosecutors in May 1999, Ramirez denied recanting her testimony, adding a double twist to the case.

“I’ve had recanting cases,” McMullen said, “but never one where the witness denies recanting.”