Three Convicted for Murder of Two Gay Men

metroweekly.com:

died from “acute intoxication” stemming from a mix of fentanyl, cocaine, ethanol, and other drugs, according to the city medical examiner’s office.Ramirez’s body was left in the back of a taxi in April 2022, while Umberger died in a townhouse a month later, while his attackers took photos and videos of them partying next to his lifeless body.At trial, prosecutors presented text messages showing that DeMaio was responsible for obtaining the fentanyl used to incapacitate the victims.

Prosecutors also presented the jury with cell phone tower data, text exchanges, security video footage, and other evidence to track the defendants’ movements as they carried out their robberies and went on shopping binges with victims’ money.The jury also heard accounts from other men who had survived similar drugging encounters.One man described waking up bruised and alone in a hotel room with his credit card and phones missing.

Prosecutors later showed him images of two men wheeling his limp body into the hotel’s lobby on a luggage cart. Another man said he could not remember inhaling a substance that another man held to his nose, as seen in a video shown to jurors.On February 10, after four hours of deliberations, the jury found Hamilton, Barroso, and DeMaio guilty of all robbery, conspiracy, and murder charges against them in connection to Ramirez’s death, as well as additional guilty verdicts against Hamilton and DeMaio for burglary and Umberger’s murder.The men could face anywhere from 25 years to life in prison.“I know the families who lost their loved ones are still suffering from so much pain, and I hope this verdict can provide at least some measure of comfort,” Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said in a statement after the.