An early morning disturbance between two men and a woman in Sullivan City Saturday left one of the men dead and the other behind bars on charges of manslaughter and accident involving injury or death.
Sullivan City police arrested 25-year-old Reyes Quijano on Saturday and charged him with the death of 23-year-old Jose Louis Ramirez.
Quijano is accused of running over Ramirez after Ramirez hit him multiple times, according to a probable cause affidavit.
Police were called to 206 Rafael Street at 5 a.m. Saturday by Melissa Velasquez, Ramirez’s ex-girlfriend, authorities say.
When they arrived, officers found Ramirez lying on the pavement with blood coming from his mouth and began chest compressions on the man, who had stopped breathing, until EMS arrived and transported him to McAllen Medical Hospital where he was pronounced dead, the charging document states.
Velasquez told police she was with Quijano, who she said was her friend, in a white SUV when a maroon vehicle parked behind them, police say.
The woman told responding officers that she exited the vehicle and approached it and recognized the driver as her ex-boyfriend, Ramirez, according to authorities.
“Mr. Ramirez approached the vehicle and began striking Mr. Quijano multiple times with his fists. Ms. Velasquez advised she attempted to stop Mr. Ramirez but was not able to. She then proceeded to turn off the ignition of the maroon vehicle which was displaying a loud noise (music),” the probable cause affidavit states.
When Velasquez turned back, she saw the white SUV speeding northbound on Rafael Street and saw Ramirez lying on the ground, according to the charging document.
Sullivan City police say in the affidavit that they obtained surveillance footage from a nearby residence that shows Quijano running over Ramirez.
“Officer Flores was able to obtain video footage and observed where a white SUV ran over a male subject who then remained on the ground,” the charging document states.
The affidavit does not say whether that surveillance footage also captured Ramirez hitting Quijano, per what Velasquez told police.
Court records also show that Ramirez had entered a guilty plea on Jan. 7, 2020, to two counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon for crashing his vehicle into a vehicle driven by Velasquez where a Marixsa Velasquez was a passenger.
He received seven years probation.
As for Quijano, he remains jailed on a total of $170,000 in bonds.
