OC: Silver Spring man found guilty of raping minor

Erick Humberto Ramirez, one of five men who was charged with attacking an unconscious 17-year-old girl in an Ocean City hotel last summer, was found guilty Monday of second-degree rape and filming child porn.

A Circuit Court jury in Snow Hill also convicted Ramirez, 21, of Silver Spring, of second-, third- and fourth-degree sex offenses and second-degree assault for the incident that occurred on May 29, 2016.

Ocean City and Worcester County police said he had videotaped four other men undressing, inappropriately touching, and raping a teenager in the Dunes Manor Hotel on 28th Street.

Ramirez’s face went white when the guilty verdicts were read, and ultimately put his head in his hands and trembled. He was sentenced 23 years, with five suspended, for all crimes.

The jury reached its verdict roughly 15 minutes after hearing hours of testimony from the victim, Ocean City Police detectives and sheriff’s deputies. A dozen videos and photographs recovered from Ramirez’s phone during his drug arrest last June were central to Assistant State’s Attorney Diane Karsnitz’s case.

“This may not be what you expect from a sexual assault case,” Karsnitz said to the jury in closing arguments. “Typically, these cases come down to he said/she said, with motive and corroborative witnesses. I think the videos speak for themselves, and Mr. Ramirez’s cell phone says everything.”

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