The deaths of two gay men in 2022 have been labeled homicides by NYC’s s medical examiner. The men Julio Ramirez and John Umberger were found dead and had their bank accounts emptied. Both had gone to gay bars and had last been seen with several men.
New York’s chief medical examiner’s office said that the two were killed by “drug-facilitated theft.”
Twenty-five-year-old Julio Ramirez’s body was found in the back of a taxi after he left the Ritz Bar with some men on April 20, 2022. About $20,000 dollars had been taken from his bank accounts.
John Umberger, 33, the second murder victim was found about a month later after he and a couple of men left the Q, a gay bar in Hell’s Kitchen His bank accounts were also drained of about $20,000.
Both men died due to “acute intoxication by the combined effects of fentanyl, p-fluorofentanyl, heroin, cocaine, lidocaine, and ethanol.”
A spokesperson for the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office said in a statement to NBC News that the investigation is “ongoing.”