Sex offender to be released

This is upsetting the man waited between 4-5 years before the commitment hearing was even held; time lost from his life. What part of that time was he still serving his prison sentence we do not know.

3-18-15 Washington:

YAKIMA, Wash. — A jury has declined to indefinitely commit a convicted sex offender who had served his term.

In a two-week trial, state officials argued that David Ramirez, 45, is a sexually violent predator who will act on his urges if he is allowed to leave state custody.

But after deliberating Tuesday evening and much of the day today, a Yakima County Superior Court jury said Ramirez should not be subject to a civil commitment.

The jury’s verdict was announced shortly after 3 p.m. Two members of Ramirez’s family were in the courtroom to hear the verdict.

“I was extremely happy for my client and his family,” Ramirez attorney Bruce Shamulka said. “If we can get David on the straight and narrow, the whole family can finally come together. It’s been a long, hard road for them.”

Jurors had to reach a unanimous verdict, and Prosecuting Attorney Fred Wist asked Judge Blaine Gibson to poll the jury. All 13 said they had determined that Ramirez is not a sexually violent predator.

“This was a very difficult case,” Wist said. “We believe that this case deserved to be heard by a jury. There isn’t anything that would make me feel any differently now that they’ve decided as they did.”

After the announcement of the verdict, Shamulka asked Gibson for an order of release and transport from the Special Commitment Center on McNeil Island.

Shamulka said that upon leaving McNeil Island, Ramirez will enroll in a rehabilitation program run by Ed Fish, the pastor of Journey Ministries in Tukwila.

The two prosecutors in the case, Wist and Joshua Studor, belong to a special division of the state Attorney General’s Office that tries civil commitment cases exclusively. Attorneys in the Sexually Violent Predator Unit travel around the state to courts in every county except King County.

In fiscal year 2014, the unit tried 14 cases. Only one of those defendants was acquitted.

Ramirez pleaded guilty in April 2007 to unlawful imprisonment with sexual motivation after police said he forced his way into a Yakima man’s apartment, stripped naked and told the 18-year-old man to engage in a sex act with him. When the man tried to flee, Ramirez pulled him back inside the apartment and fondled him, according to court records.

Ramirez was sentenced to five years in prison, the maximum for the offense. In 2010, the state moved to have Ramirez deemed a sexually violent predator. After several delays, the hearing began two weeks ago. Ramirez served part of his sentence at the McNeil Island facility and has remained confined there since at least 2010.

During the trial, Assistant Attorney General Joshua Studor said the 2010 crime was Ramirez’s fifth sexually related conviction since 2001. His victims include a group of teenage girls he propositioned, a middle-age woman he fondled and offered to pay for sex, the 18-year-old man and Ramirez’s girlfriend. ..Source.. by David Edwards

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