Social worker Julio Ramirez, 25, met up with a friend on April 20 for a night out in Hell’s Kitchen, a Manhattan neighborhood near New York’s Times Square known for its lively restaurant and bar scene. His last stop was the Ritz Bar and Lounge, a popular multi-level LGBTQ+ spot in the heart of the neighborhood’s Restaurant Row.
Surveillance footage from a nearby security camera shows Ramirez walking away with three unidentified men at 3:17 a.m., according to his brother, Carlos, who said investigators reported him. The four men then got into a nearby taxi, a law enforcement source said, but Ramirez was alone in the back seat at 4:10 a.m. when the driver approached a police officer 3 miles away in the Lower East neighborhood. Side of Manhattan to tell her that her passenger was unresponsive.
Despite the officer’s and the Emergency Medical Services team’s efforts to save his life, Ramirez was pronounced dead at a nearby hospital at 4:49 a.m. on April 21, a police source said, adding that the initial cause of death was listed as “possible drug overdose.” Ramírez’s official “cause and manner of death” are pending further study, according to the coroner, who told NBC News in an email that this could take “at least a few weeks.” Ramirez was initially identified as “John Doe,” his brother said, because neither his wallet nor his phone were with him when he died.
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