CHICAGO – A judge has imposed a 16-year prison sentence on a man who carjacked a woman at gunpoint while out on bail on a new armed carjacking charge and who was on probation for another weapons case.
Nicolas Ramirez, 22, pleaded guilty Friday before Judge Mary Anna Planey to hijacking vehicles with a weapon and a separate armed robbery. She imposed a concurrent 16-year prison sentence on each charge.
But let’s start at the beginning. In May 2022, Ramirez pleaded guilty to felony firearm possession in exchange for a sentence of 50 hours of community service and two years of “probation for gun offenders” from Judge Stanley Sacks.
Just three months later, Ramirez pulled a gun and carjacked a driver in Cicero, prosecutors say. When the driver got out of his car, Ramirez pistol-whipped him and ordered him to flee or risk being shot, prosecutors alleged. Carjacking charges against Cicero are still pending.
A while later, Ramirez allegedly jumped out of the newly hijacked car and tried to rob someone else. When that victim didn’t comply, Ramirez hit them in the face with a gun and fled, prosecutors said.
Unable to post bail in those cases, Ramirez remained in jail for a few months until Judge Geary Kull lowered his bail to $2,500 and sent him home with an ankle monitor. A few months later, Kull also removed the ankle monitor.
And then Ramirez stopped showing up for court. Within two weeks, Ramirez would be active in the carjacking industry again.
At 2:30 p.m. on July 11, 2023, Ramirez threatened to kill a 57-year-old woman as he carjacked her at gunpoint in the 2500 block of South Springfield, prosecutors said. Ramirez allegedly knocked on the woman’s driver’s window and pulled a gun from the back of his waistband.
“Go away, m*****f*****, or I’ll kill you,” he ordered.
She complied and immediately called 911. Chicago police intercepted the car less than five minutes later and trapped it among a bunch of construction equipment and a swarm of police cars.
Ramirez is scheduled to appear in court again this week to face Judge Geary Kull about the ongoing carjacking case against Cicero. If he is found guilty, his sentence is expected to run consecutively to the 16 years he received on Friday.
