A former school-resource officer has lost his law enforcement license two years after he showed violent pornographic images to a group of young girls.
Former Orange County, California, Sheriff's Deputy Justin Raymond Ramirez was in his marked patrol car during lunchtime on Sept. 2, 2022, when he showed three female students a series of extreme videos on his phone.
Days later, one of those students, 14 years old at the time, told her mother, who reported to the Orange County Sheriff's Department (OCSD), leading to misdemeanor charges against Ramirez.
According to a POST (Peace Officer Standards and Training) Commission report, the first video showed a couple engaging explicitly in intercourse when a man enters the room and appears to stab the woman to death. The next video contained two men smoking a controlled substance together. One man blows smoke into the "rear end area" of the other man. Ramirez then showed the girls a photo of a woman's leg inflicted with a severe dog bite.
According to the civil suit obtained by The Orange County Register, the girl's mother called the OCSD, asked how to go about filing a report, and "emphatically" told the dispatcher she did not want anyone sent to her home. She "feared the police would accidentally send the actual perpetrator to her home."
Two deputies were ultimately sent to her home and one of them, according to the lawsuit, was none other than Ramirez, who did not disclose his role in the incident.
"One of the deputies later learned to be Ramirez had a grin on his face as (the mother) explained her trepidation," the lawsuit says. "The entire time (the mother) was talking, Ramirez had a strange grin on his face, acting as if (the mother) was totally exaggerating. (The mother) spent several minutes telling both officers how 'sick this policeman is,' all the while not knowing she was actually speaking to Ramirez, the perpetrator, himself."
Ramirez resigned from his position that December, and was charged in Feb. 2023 with distributing or exhibiting pornography to a minor. That April, he agreed to a court-ordered diversion program that would allow him to avoid jail time and petition to dismiss the charges upon completion. Shortly after, Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer urged the POST Commission to permanently revoke Ramirez's law enforcement certification.
Over one year later, on Sept. 12, 2024, the Commission formally voted to do so, and Ramirez was stripped of his license to work in law enforcement. The action came days after a civil suit was filed against Ramirez, the county, and Sheriff Don Barnes. Ramirez's decertification will be forwarded to a national database of ineligible officers, barring him from obtaining employment as a police officer outside of California.
Due to a government code that prevents files relating to complaints and investigations of police misconduct from being disclosed publicly, the POST report was confidential until Ramirez's license was permanently revoked.
The now-public report reveals alarming details uncovered during a search of Ramirez's personal cell phone.
The search yielded multiple photos of dead bodies at crime scenes, including scenes OCSD had investigated. The phone contained one video where Ramirez recorded himself inside OCSD office space unzipping his sheriff uniform pants and exposing himself to the camera. Another video shows a couple having sex and appears to be recorded through a window looking into the home. In another recording, Ramirez filmed himself speaking with a potentially mentally ill transient male, jokingly telling him to, "Get off the meth, ok?"
The POST report urges the Commission to "protect the public from Ramirez," stating he has "disrespected the uniform and the Sheriff's Department.
According to govsalaries.com, as an Orange County Deputy Sheriff, Justin Ramirez was paid an annual salary of over $260,000.
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