A state appeals court has thrown out a violation of civil rights conviction and hate crimes enhancement for a man who carried out an unprovoked attack on an African American employee at a Laguna Beach grocery store.
Fernando Ramirez admitted in explicit terms that he hated Black people and punched the employee because he was Black, but the appeals court found those comments were improperly obtained by police after Ramirez received his Miranda advisement and invoked his right to an attorney.
In a written opinion released Wednesday, the panel of appellate judges let stand a felony battery conviction against Ramirez, but threw out a misdemeanor conviction for violating civil rights by force and a felony hate enhancement.
Ramirez, a 24-year-old San Clemente resident, was sentenced last year to six years in prison. It was not immediately clear how much his sentence would be reduced without the dismissed charge.
On June 15, 2019, Ramirez ran up behind the 26-year-old employee and sucker-punched him, breaking the employee’s nose and damaging two of his front teeth. A couple who witnessed the attack called 911 and followed Ramirez until officers arrived.
The appellate judges determined that the evidence at trial that Ramirez attacked the employee due to his race was based on a conversation Ramirez had with an officer after Ramirez had invoked his right to an attorney and as he was being transported in a police car to local lockup.
During that recorded conversation, Ramirez told the officer that he hated Black people, used numerous racial epithets and asked to be segregated away from other races in jail, according to a transcript included in the appellate ruling.
Prosecutors were allowed to introduce the statements during the trial after arguing that Ramirez was the one who started the conversation in the police car and claiming the officer was not interrogating Ramirez but instead asking him questions because the officer was having a hard time hearing Ramirez over traffic noise.
The appellate judges disagreed, finding that the statements Ramirez made in the police car were obtained in violation of his Miranda rights, and should have been excluded from trial.Greg Akili, director of the Fannie Lou Hamer Institute and a Southern California Black Lives Matter organizer, said it was clear from Ramirez’s comments that he is a racist, despite the legal technicality that led to the charges being dismissed. Such charges are necessary to fight both individual and institutional racism, he added.
“They do send a message that that kind of behavior is not accepted or tolerated,” Akili said.
It wasn’t immediately clear whether prosecutors would seek a retrial on the charges that were thrown out.
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