Self-defense claim made in cop's death

[D E M I G O D]

Self-defense claim made in cop's death

By DAVID SIMPSON
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/dekalb/0503/28ramirez.html
Bautista Ramirez (left) is accused of shooting Doraville police officer Hugo
Arango in May 2000.
A Cherokee County man on trial for his life in the killing of a Doraville
police officer will take the witness stand to say he fired in self-defense
after the officer cursed him and struck him with a flashlight, a defense
attorney told jurors Tuesday.

In opening statements in the trial of Bautista Ramirez, a DeKalb County
Superior Court jury heard starkly different interpretations of the May 13,
2000, killing of officer Hugo Arango.

Assistant District Attorney Mike McDaniel said Ramirez shot Arango, 24,
without provocation in the parking lot outside the Eclipse nightclub on
Buford Highway because he didn't want to be arrested for carrying a
concealed weapon. In McDaniel's scenario, Ramirez, then 19, was being
frisked when he pulled the gun from his waistband and faced Arango and the
manager of the club, David Contreras.

The prosecutor described in detail the wounds that blinded Contreras in one
eye and severed Arango's brain stem.

"That man right there, Bautista Ramirez, murdered a police officer and
blinded an unarmed man," McDaniel said.

But defense attorney Thomas West said two women who were walking through the
parking lot will support Ramirez's account that Arango cursed Ramirez and
his cousin, then-16-year-old Alvaro Ramirez, and told the cousin he would
"bash your [expletive] head in" unless he kept his hands up.

In West's account to the jury, Bautista Ramirez tried to flee when the
officer found his gun, but Arango struck him on top of the head with the
butt of his flashlight, causing a concussion.

West said Ramirez feared for his life and "desperately" fired, striking
Contreras, as he fell to the ground with Arango on his back.

Ramirez then reached around his body and fired more shots under his arm and
over his shoulder, including the fatal shot through Arango's head, West
said.

West conceded Ramirez should not have had the gun, but he said Ramirez was
doing nothing wrong and was approached by Arango only because of a report
someone had been breaking into cars.

"He was in the wrong place at the wrong time," West said.

During the opening statements, Judge Gail Flake's small courtroom was filled
with relatives of Ramirez and Arango and other spectators, including the
Mexican consul general in Atlanta, Remedios Gomez-Arnau. Ramirez is an
illegal immigrant from Mexico.

The prosecution began presenting its case Tuesday, calling two police
officers who found Arango in the parking lot and tried to stop his bleeding
and perform CPR.
Jurors were shown a photo blowup of a pool of the officer's blood running
along the double yellow lines of a parking space.
The trial will continue today.
If the jury convicts Ramirez of murder, it will then consider whether he
should be executed after a penalty-phase hearing.
No DeKalb jury has approved a death sentence since Georgia law was changed
in 1993 to allow the option of life without parole.
--

This was your desire. And here I am now, always to be with you
as a worst nightmare. Because I will hold YOU to the contract of
your choice, which you coerced me to sign, but unwilling to keep.

DEMIGOD