José Ledesma, the intellectual author of the 2019 murder of Cuban dentist Carmen Ramírez, finally appeared this Wednesday in the Miami-Dade criminal court for that crime, more than four and a half years after the murder.
On November 18, 2019, Carmen Ramírez, 60, was climbing the stairs to her dental office in Hialeah when a man named Ralph Benjamin shot her six times before quickly fleeing in a black BMW Series 5 vehicle, driven by Héctor Ledesma, brother of José Ledesma.
The woman lay on the ground until paramedics arrived at the scene and provided first aid. Due to the severity of her injuries, she had to be airlifted to Jackson Memorial Hospital, where she underwent surgery and received a blood transfusion.
The bullets caused injuries to Ramírez in the face, neck, chest, and extremities. The woman died on December 19, 2019, a month after being hospitalized.
The surveillance cameras that captured the moment of the attack provided crucial evidence for investigators.
Héctor Ledesma and Ralph Benjamin were arrested two days after the murder at Miami International Airport while attempting to flee to the Virgin Islands, Benjamin's country of origin and the perpetrator of the crime.
The police, at a press conference, confirmed that the arrests were made possible by the images from the security cameras and the rapid response of the investigation teams.
As the investigation progressed, dark details emerged about José Ledesma's past.
In 2015, Carmen Ramírez had been a victim of identity theft in which José Ledesma was involved. The fraud cost Ramírez and her practice more than $40,000.
At the time of the murder, Ledesma was facing a trial for this crime, with the possibility of receiving a sentence of 3 to 5 years if found guilty. Carmen Ramírez was the main witness in that case, which gave José Ledesma a reason to want to eliminate her.
However, José Ledesma was released on bail in November 2019, shortly after Carmen Ramírez was shot.
Although the Hialeah detectives immediately suspected that Ledesma had organized the attack from jail, the Orlando prosecutors did not revoke his bail and did not return him to prison.
Several weeks after the shooting in Hialeah, Ledesma raped a 15-year-old girl who became pregnant.
That new crime brought him back to prison, where he faced three different criminal trials in the city of Orlando, along with an ongoing murder investigation in Miami-Dade County.
During his appearance this Wednesday, in which he appeared as a defendant for first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit first-degree murder, he was taken into custody without the right to bail.
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