Police: Suspect communicated with victim before fatal shooting

Published 3:28 pm Thursday, February 27, 2025

EVERETT — On the morning of Dec. 11, police believe Bryan Hernandez-Ramirez communicated several times with a 42-year-old man from south Everett on social media apps.

Both men messaged about Hernandez-Ramirez’s desire to rob somebody and split the profits, court documents said. The victim said he was uninterested in a robbery, but they discussed the possibility of a sexual meet-up.

Around 7:30 p.m. on Dec. 11, the south Everett man was found dead from multiple gunshot wounds in the driver’s seat of a white Mercedes.

On Tuesday, police arrested Hernandez-Ramirez in connection with the shooting and booked him into Snohomish County Jail on suspicion of second-degree murder.

Hernandez-Ramirez, who was 17 at the time of the shooting, appeared in court Wednesday. Everett District Court Pro Tem Judge David Ruzumna found probable cause to hold Hernandez-Ramirez on two murder charges. At the prosecution’s request, Ruzumna set bail at $2 million.

A probable cause statement reveals additional details of what police believe happened leading up to and after the shooting.

Before the alleged shooting, Hernandez-Ramirez posted several images and videos of himself with various firearms, including a Ruger pistol. He also had multiple online conversations claiming affiliation with the criminal street gang South Side Locos through words and hand signs.

At 8:14 a.m. on Dec. 11, Hernandez-Ramirez and the victim began exchanging messages on Grindr, a dating app primarily used by the LGBTQ+ community. By 10 a.m., both men switched their conversation to Snapchat.

Detectives believe these messages referenced Hernandez-Ramirez’s pitch to rob someone and split the profits. At 10 a.m., Hernandez-Ramirez asked the victim if they wanted to “hang out,” the probable cause statement said.

Hernandez-Ramirez told the victim he was 18 and interested in a sexual meet-up. When the victim said he enjoyed group sex, Hernandez-Ramirez responded in the chat, “Really not me, I like just two,” but later offered to bring a friend, to which the victim agreed, court documents said.

They arranged to meet at Wendy’s at the 9900 block of 19th Avenue Southeast. Surveillance footage from WinCo confirmed Hernandez-Ramirez and another 18-year-old were outside Wendy’s before getting into the victim’s Mercedes. The vehicle left the area and arrived at the crime scene at 7:30 p.m.

Surveillance video from a nearby apartment building showed a vehicle pulling into the parking lot where the shooting happened.

“This was a dark area,” the probable cause statement said. All that could be seen was some movement across the taillights of the video.

Two minutes later, five distinctive gunshots could be heard. A person resembling Hernandez-Ramirez could be seen running, leaving the location while discarding a Ruger magazine, police said.

A 911 call at 7:35 p.m. came from a person identifying himself as “Brian Hernandez.” The person said he witnessed a man shoot another man during an argument at the nearby Charter Club Apartments. He described the shooter as wearing an orange zip-up hooded sweatshirt and fleeing westbound on Silver Lake Road. The caller had used an Optum employee’s phone and left before officers arrived.

Everett police believe that person on the phone was Hernandez-Ramirez.

Investigators recovered five 9mm cartridge casings in the parking lot south of the driver’s side of the Mercedes. An autopsy later showed the victim had been shot five times.

Detective Alexander Helphrey wrote that he believed the incident was a setup, potentially to rob or assault the victim, but noted that he could not yet prove this definitively.

“While it is possible that he is in fact gay and just deflecting or keeping his sexual identity a secret, I believe it more likely that he was using Grindr … to target a victim that he would not be able to be tied to,” Helphrey wrote. “…while I cannot say at this time which of the two males actually shot [omitted name], … I believe that Hernandez was at minimum a party to the crime … there is probable cause to believe that Bryan Hernandez-Ramirez … committed the crime of murder in the second-degree.”

This story has been updated to clarify that the victim was uniterested in commiting a robbery.

Aspen Anderson: 425-339-3192; aspen.anderson@heraldnet.com; X: @aspenwanderson.