Lawyers for the man who admitted ambushing and killing Sacramento Police Officer Tara O’Sullivan as she tried to help a woman retrieve her belongings from an abusive partner asked jurors Wednesday to spare him the death penalty.
Adel Sambrano Ramos, 51, sat quietly, long hair pulled back in a ponytail and swaying slightly in his chair, as defense attorney Jan Karowsky said he would not dispute any facts in the case and that he expected jurors to recognize his client would like to execute. , as opening arguments in the penalty phase of the case began before Sacramento Superior Court Judge James Arguelles.
Ramos pleaded guilty on August 30 to felonies including murder with special circumstances for O’Sullivan’s killing and attempted murder of another officer at the violent, bloody scene in Del Paso Heights in June 2019. He initially pleaded not guilty, but the trial was postponed because his lawyers argued that he was mentally unfit to stand trial.
Now a jury must decide, in a criminal trial expected to last about three weeks, whether Ramos should be put to death. California hasn’t carried out an execution since 2006, but the death penalty remains on the books. Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a moratorium on the death penalty in 2019, but a future governor or court ruling could reinstate it.
Regardless, prosecutors said the verdict would send a strong message and bring relief to the victims’ families.
O’Sullivan’s killing sent shockwaves through the capital region and prompted the city to rename the H Street Bridge over the American River as a memorial.
On Wednesday, prosecutor Jeffrey Hightower described O’Sullivan, who grew up in the Bay Area and graduated from a criminal justice program at Sacramento State, as a dedicated young officer who demonstrated a keen sense of right and wrong even as a child. She was still in training when she urged her partner to respond to a call from Megan Jansa, who at the time lived with Ramos in the Redwood Avenue house she inherited from her grandfather.
O’Sullivan didn’t have to go to that call in North Sacramento, Hightower said, and it wasn’t clear at the time that Ramos had committed a crime, but she persuaded her training officer to pick it up.
She didn’t know, Hightower said, and Jansa later described in testimony that Ramos had kept Jansa awake all night with threats, saying he would kill her dogs, that he would kill her and bury her with a shovel that he brought into the house. . He had collected numerous firearms, including assault weapons, including one that he tucked into the waistband of his trousers as he walked in and out of the bedroom in anger.
When O’Sullivan and other officers arrived at the home, hoping to help Jansa gather her belongings safely, they found the front door barricaded, Hightower said, causing them to enter the property from the side. Ramos gave no indication that he was there. He did not respond to their calls, including a statement from officers that they were not there to arrest him, Hightower said.
But when the team moved to check if anyone was hiding in the detached garage, Ramos erupted and started shooting, Hightower said. He shot O’Sullivan in the head and she fell.
He continued to fire at her, bullets moving dirt and debris as he aimed at her chest.
“Are you dead yet?” he shouted in a series of vulgarities, swear words and taunts that Hightower described and that Karowsky did not dispute.
Once they heard all the evidence, Hightower said, jurors would see that imposing the death penalty would be the right thing to do.
But Karowsky asked jurors to take into account the abuse and trauma Ramos suffered as a child in the Philippines before imposing such a harsh sentence.
The family was poor, he said, and lived with a large family in a house without running water. Ramos, one of four brothers, was beaten by his father for the smallest of infractions; seizures that were worse when his father was drunk. The father was stabbed to death by Ramos’ uncle when he was five. The boy, who rushed into the room with family members, tried to stop the bleeding with his own small hands, Karowsky said.
He was later abused by relatives who had to care for him after his mother left the Philippines to look for work in Hong Kong, Karowsky said.
Karowsky predicted that jurors’ instinct might be to impose the death penalty after hearing details of Ramos’ behavior.
“You’re going to be upset,” he told the jury. ‘You’re going to get angry. You will want to make a decision at that time.”
But Karowsky said he would bring witnesses, including family members, who would testify about Ramos’ childhood experiences and ask that his life be spared.
“Mr. Ramos is here today as a human being,” Karowsky said. “He has pleaded guilty to all his crimes.”
