PINOLE -- An East Bay triple-murder suspect left his cell phone behind at the scene of a Pinole burglary and then called it to get it back, unaware that a police officer was on the other end, authorities said today.
Although Anthony Ramirez eluded officers, he was arrested several days later while unknowingly texting a second officer in another desperate attempt to find it, Pinole police Sgt. Matthew Messier said.
Ramirez, 23, never got his cell phone back. Instead, he is now in jail, charged with killing a man in Emeryville and suspected of two other homicides in Contra Costa County, Messier said.
It all began at about 9:30 p.m. May 22 when the suspect broke a window to get into a home on Alice Way in Pinole. The resident interrupted the break-in, and the burglar fled out the same window. But he left his cell phone behind.
As Pinole police were scouring the home for evidence that night, they heard a cell phone ring. Officer Uri Nieves answered it.
"Hey, did you find my phone?" said the voice on the other end.
Nieves acted as if he was "just some guy who picked it up off the street," Messier said. Nieves nailed his role. "He's a very street-savvy officer who actually grew up in a rough neighborhood in Sacramento," Messier said.
Nieves asked the caller what his name was, and he replied, "Tony." So as to continue the masquerade, Nieves arranged to return the phone to Tony - for a price - at the Boys and Girls Club on Appian Way.
Ramirez drove to the scene in a stolen Nissan 350Z with a 17-year-old boy in the passenger seat, police said. Pinole police tried to box the car in with their cruisers, but Ramirez escaped after crashing the Nissan at Appian and Garden Way, Messier said. Officers found a sawed-off 30-30 rifle in the car.
Pinole police soon identified Ramirez as the suspect and learned that he had been sought by Emeryville police in the April 20, 2008 shooting death of Chad Clarke on the 5500 block of Beaudry Street.
Pinole police put Ramirez's cell phone in an evidence bag and turned it over to Emeryville police.
On Wednesday, officers found Ramirez outside a home on Samuels Street in Pinole, where he had apparently been sleeping on a mattress on the front porch, Messier said. Even as officers were closing in on him, Ramirez was texting his phone to arrange a meeting to get it back, unaware that the person on the other end - this time - was an Emeryville police officer, Messier said.
Ramirez spotted the Pinole and Contra Costa sheriff's deputies coming for him and ran straight into the "barrels of the guns" of Messier and a deputy, Messier said. Two other sawed-off rifles were found at the home, police said.
Ramirez had also been sought on arrest warrants in the April beating death of El Cerrito city employee Bruce King, 55, in his El Sobrante home, as well as the September shooting death of Ryan Valdez, Ramirez's half-brother, said Jimmy Lee, sheriff's spokesman. A second suspect in King's slaying, Raymond Gardner, 45, was charged with murder.
Messier said police were gratified that Ramirez was arrested without incident, because the swastika-tattooed suspect had told an acquaintance that "he was not going to be taken alive."
