Three sickos who drugged, robbed gay men in nyc sentenced to decades in prison for murder

A sick trio were sentenced Wednesday to decades in prison over a Big Apple gay bar drugging scheme that left two men dead. Jayqwan Hamilton, 37, Jacob Barroso, 32, and Robert DeMaio, 36,

were handed the sentences by a Manhattan judge for facilitating the years-long fentanyl-wielding robbery plot. The men, who were found guilty back in February, were nabbed after Julio

Ramirez, a 25-year-old social worker, and John Umberger, a 33-year-old political consultant, turned up dead in 2022 — both after bar hopping in Hell’s Kitchen. “What happened to my brother

wasn’t just tragic. It was intentional. It was an act of greed and it was evil. He was targeted, drugged, robbed and discarded,” Ramirez’s grief-stricken brother, Carlos Ramirez, told a

packed court during the sentencing hearing. EXPLORE MORE “These are people who had such little regard for human life that they can watch a person die in front of them and walk away like

nothing happened and go along without their lives,” he continued – urging the judge to inflict the toughest possible sentence. “That kind of evil doesn’t get reformed in prison, it is

ingrained. If anything, they will just come out worse and take more innocent lives. These men are a threat to society, they are dangerous.” All three men were convicted in Ramirez’s murder,

while Hamilton and DeMaio were also sentenced over the other man’s death. Hamilton and DeMaio were both given sentences of 40 years to life, while Barroso was handed a 20 year sentence.

“This was a cold and calculated pattern,” said Judge Felicia Mennin before handing down the sentences. “I pity your lack of humanity and empathy for your fellow human beings.” Hamilton spoke

briefly during the hearing saying he was “sympathetic: to the victims’ families but maintains his innocence.  “I did not drug anyone,” he said.  The trio kicked off their ghoulish campaign

back in March 2022 by chatting up inebriated men, knocking them out with their lethal chemical cocktails and then robbing them blind, prosecutors said during the trial.   Two of the perps

had approached Ramirez outside The Ritz bar in Manhattan in April of 2022  before convincing him to get in a cab with them. After giving him cocaine laced with fentanyl, prosecutors said the

defendants drained his bank accounts and went on a wild shopping spree — leaving their young victim for dead in the cab. They then hit up Umberger the following month outside The Q NYC

before going back to his townhouse to carry on their crime spree.  A medical examiner later determined the two victims had died from “acute intoxication” stemming from a mix of fentanyl,

cocaine, ethanol and other drugs. “These defendants simply did not care if their victims lived or died,” Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg at a news conference following the

sentencing. “It’s clear how loved both men were to their communities, their bright futures cut short by the wanton disregard for their lives displayed by the defendants,” Bragg added. A

statement from Ramirez’s parents read by an interpreter said they “replay his last moments constantly.” “We lost him to a calculated, cold and heartless act of greed. He was drugged, robbed

and left alone in the back of a cab like his life meant nothing.”