The Miami-Dade Police Chief and His Spouse Argued Earlier than He Shot Himself, Bodycam Footage Exhibits

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — Cops responding to a report of somebody with a gun threatening to “finish all of it” exterior a downtown Florida lodge found the individual in query was the director of the Miami-Dade police force.

Newly launched bodycam footage gives a recent have a look at the July 23 incident, which occurred hours earlier than Alfredo “Freddy” Ramirez stopped his car, along with his spouse, Jody Ramirez, inside, alongside Interstate 75 south of Tampa and shot himself within the head.

Jody Ramirez frantically known as 911, and the police chief was rushed to a Tampa hospital, the place he remained in secure situation Thursday after surgical procedure final week, information retailers reported. An individual who answered the telephone on the hospital on Thursday mentioned the police director’s title was not on a listing of registered sufferers. Messages searching for updates had been left Thursday with police and on the workplace of Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava.

Tampa police had been initially known as round 6:30 p.m. that Sunday night to a lodge the place the Florida Sheriff’s annual convention was underway. Somebody noticed a person and lady arguing exterior the lodge and known as 911 after they mentioned the person, later recognized as 52-year-old Ramirez, pointed a gun to his head.

By the point police arrived, the couple had gone to their twelfth flooring room, lodge safety advised the officers, in accordance with bodycam footage. The witnesses who reported the couple’s argument had been now not on the scene, and officers could not discover lodge safety footage of the incident, in accordance with the police report.

A swarm of officers then runs upstairs.

“Tampa Police! Tampa Police! Come out together with your arms up. Arms up!” an officer says on the bodycam video.

A girl, later recognized as Jody Ramirez, comes out of the room, adopted by her husband, who “needed to be advised a number of occasions to indicate his arms,” in accordance with the report.

Ramirez is then handcuffed, the video exhibits.

“What are you doing?” he asks the officers. “All proper. You realize, I’m the director of the Miami-Dade Police Division.”

The officers ask him for identification, which he says is in his pockets within the room. His gun, in its holster, is discovered beneath a chair.

Exterior, officers continued speaking to Ramirez, and individually, to his spouse.

“Man, I didn’t do something man, please,” Ramirez says. “… Should you write a report, you guys are going to blow my ass up. I didn’t do something, please.”

The officers ask if he displayed a gun through the discuss along with his spouse.

“No, no, sir, OK? We had a dialogue,” Ramirez says. He tells them the argument was about “marriage stuff,” and provides, “We’re good.”

Close by, different officers query Jody Ramirez, asking if the argument received bodily or whether or not her husband had pointed the gun at himself or at her. “Um, truthfully, I can’t bear in mind,” she says, including that they’d been ingesting

She tells the officers they had been “simply having a heated dialog,” which she remarked wasn’t uncommon after 30 years of marriage.

She additionally tells the officers that her husband at all times has his gun on him, “has loads of demons from the job,” and has a mood. “He’s not making any threats, I promise you,” she says.

After questioning the couple, Alfredo Ramirez is uncuffed, and the couple leaves the lodge to return residence to Miami, in accordance with the police report. About 8:30 p.m., Ramirez calls his boss, Levine Cava, and gives his resignation.

“Freddy advised me he had made a mistake, he was ready to resign,” the mayor recounted throughout a July 26 information convention. She mentioned Ramirez was “very remorseful” throughout their dialog, and that she advised him to get residence safely and they might talk about it the subsequent day. Someday after that, he shot himself, in accordance with the police transcript.

Ramirez is a 27-year Miami-Dade police veteran and leads the most important regulation enforcement company within the southeastern U.S. In Might, he introduced his intention to hunt election subsequent yr to the newly created function of sheriff. It is unclear if he’ll stay within the race. Within the meantime, Levine Cava has appointed an interim police director.

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