Miami-Dade jurors opt for life over death for convicted murderer of small-time dealer
Jurors on Thursday spared the life of a man convicted last month of the brash murder of a small-time drug dealer over a decade ago, deliberating for just over an hour and extending a growing streak of distaste by Miami-Dade jurors of sending defendants to death row.
In a hushed courtroom at Miami-Dade's downtown criminal courthouse, a court clerk read aloud the 12-member jury's decision to send convicted murderer Anthawn Ragan Jr., to prison for the rest of his life with no chance of parole. The jury's only other choice was death.
Ragan, 30, who sat quietly for most of the week-long trial, often visibly shaking, showed some emotion after the verdict was read, bowing his head slightly. His mother was visibly shaken, sobbing under a burgundy-colored hoodie, her face hidden.
The family of Ragan's victim, Luis Miguel Perez, sat silently. His mother Madrestia Figueroa spoke to the media briefly outside the courtroom.
'At least he won't be out on the street anymore hurting families like he did mine,' she said in Spanish.
The state's lead prosecutor, Assistant Miami-Dade State Attorney Scott Warfman, and co-counsel Arvid Singh left quickly without a word. While Ragan's lead attorney Tony Moss — who defended his client's father on a murder charge in the 1990s — hugged Ragan's mother, then briefly quoted Shakespeare.
'This jury displayed the power of God,' he said.
Though Ragan, who's been in prison since 2013 for the murder of Perez, managed to escape death row — it could be short-lived. The state is also seeking his death in the shooting death of a 10-year-old boy during the robbery of a nail salon just three weeks after Perez was killed.
A three-week fatal crime wave
State prosecutors say the Perez murder was the first leg of violence in a three-week crime wave by Ragan that ended in two deaths, two attempted murders and a vicious robbery at an all-night hamburger joint. The spree began with the Nov. 1, 2013, shooting death of Perez and ended with Nov. 22, 2013, murder of Aaron Vu, 10, at a nail salon in northwest Miami-Dade.
Aaron's death shocked a community and led to vigils and prayer services. It's the only crime during Ragan's wave in which he has yet to be tried or convicted.
In April, he was found guilty of the first-degree murder of Perez just outside his second-floor motel room. During the trial and sentencing, jurors watched video that showed Perez and a cohort named Terry Neely stalk Perez at the motel. At first, they went up to Perez's room, but he wasn't there.
Then they drove off but stopped near the motel'sentrance and spoke to someone in another car before turning around and parking again near the steps of the building. Perez returned shortly after a visit to a convenience store across the street. After he walked up the steps to his room, Ragan is seen bounding up the steps, then firing at unarmed Perez several times.
Neely — who may have added years to his sentence by reneging on a deal to testify against Ragan during the April trial — followed Ragan up the steps and fired at Perez repeatedly as he lay mortally wounded on the second-floor balcony. Then the two men raced down the stairs, got into a Nissan Maxima and took off — for a strip club.
What was never answered at trial: A motive behind the shooting death of Perez.
Then less than a week later on Nov. 7, a car Ragan was in pulled up next to a bicyclist as he rode his bike home early one morning. Prosecutors say Ragan, in the passenger seat, demanded money and shot the cyclist, Kevin Burke, as he tried to pedal away.
Burke spent months in the hospital recovering. The case went cold until 2019, when investigators linked the weapon used to shoot Burke with the one used in the shooting death of Perez. Ragan was found guilty of the attempted murder of Burke.
Two days after Burke was shot, Ragan tried to rip off a Northwest Miami-Dade Royal Castle before it closed just before sunrise. He was found guilty of several counts of aggravated assault and armed robbery during the incident in which he put a gun to the head of Numa-Alphonse Mitke, an employee who refused Ragan's order to open the store's safe.
On the witness stand this week, Mitke said Ragan was determined to shoot her.
'You can shoot me if you want,' Mitke told jurors she told Ragan. 'But you're going to get caught. I remember I told him that.'
Then on Nov. 22, prosecutors say Ragan and another man entered Hong Kong Nail Salon, 14832 NW Seventh Ave., with their guns drawn and collected more than $300 in cash and jewelry from customers and employees. But as they were leaving, investigators say, Ragan turned around and fired at Aaron and his father, killing the child and leaving Hai Nam Vu with a gunshot wound he would recover from.
Ragan never had chance as a child
During the week-long trial, Ragan's defense team argued his life should be spared because of a troubled childhood in which he regularly changed schools and committed crimes elevating to carjacking. They explained how his father was imprisoned for life on a murder charge while Ragan was still in his mother's womb and how several family members were absent during his upbringing, many serving time behind bars for serious crimes.
Clincal psychologists told jurors how Ragan's emotions and ability to control his impulses weren't fully formed when he was 18 and committed the crimes. They said his IQ was in the 70s. At age 18, a normal IQ score is around 105, studies show.
At one point during closing arguments Thursday, lead defense attorney Moss turned toward to Perez's family saying, 'We are truly and humbly sorry.'
Moss argued that Death Row was a waste of time and money. He repeated statistics first brought up by a corrections expert who said Florida averages only 2.2 executions a year compared to the 3.6 people who die of old age each year while on Death Row. He said the average inmate was on Death Row for 30 years and that it cost the state $1.2 million a year for every Death Row inmate.
Begging for his client's life, Moss told jurors either way Ragan would die before he ever leaves prison.
'He's a young man who did not have sufficient rebar in his concrete,' said the attorney. 'We don't have to do this. We don't have to go that far.'
State prosecutors, meanwhile, had doctors testify that Ragan was not stupid, but manipulative, often answering test questions incorrectly on purpose. They said he would never be reformed in prison and deserved to die for the crimes he committed.
They said that Ragan had wracked up more than two dozen write-ups in jail, mostly for fighting, but also for indecent exposure.
Lead state prosecutor Warfman told jurors that Ragan was 'brazen' in his crime wave, disregarding and disrespecting life. He said video of the Perez shooting showed how it wasn't about robbery, but all for the 'thrill.'
'He left behind his path of destruction and pain,' Warfman said.
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