'Gut wrenching': Man murdered ex-girlfriend inside Burger King while she was working

Gerardo Vazquez Alvarez (Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office) and authorities responding to the Burker King where he killed Maria Ledesma-Ramirez (KTVK screenshot).

A 30-year-old man in Arizona will spend several decades behind bars for killing his ex-girlfriend while she was working at Burger King, placing an order and waiting for her to appear behind the counter before gunning her down .

A Maricopa County judge ordered Gerardo Vazquez Alvarez to serve a sentence of 42 years in a state correctional facility for the fatal shooting of 25-year-old Maria Ledesma-Ramirez, authorities announced.

Alvarez had initially been charged with first-degree murder and attempted first-degree murder. However, he reached a deal with prosecutors and pleaded guilty to reduced charges of second-degree murder, attempt to commit second-degree murder, and felony disorderly conduct with a weapon in April.

According to a news release from the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office, officers with the Phoenix Police Department on April 12, 2023 responded to multiple reports regarding a shooting inside of a Burger King at 19th Avenue and Buckeye Road.

Witnesses told investigators that Alvarez arrived at the restaurant, placed his order, and then “waited for the victim to come to the front counter before walking over and shooting her. One of Ledesma-Ramirez’s co-workers — a teenager — was also critically injured in the shooting. Prosecutors said that Ledesma-Ramirez and the co-worker were both behind the counter and hugging each other when Alvarez shot them, Phoenix CBS affiliate KTVK reported .

“The fact that you have two victims just right there is significant. That you’re willing to shoot through a human being to kill another,” Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell reportedly said. “Now we have two kids that lost their mom at a very young age. The circumstances of the case were just gut wrenching.”

Authorities said that just before going to the Burger King with a loaded .40-caliber handgun, Alvarez had gotten into an argument with Ledesma-Ramirez regarding their relationship and their children.

When Alvarez was tracked by police and arrested, he told detectives that he did not intend to kill Ledesma-Ramirez, but claimed that during their telephone argument, she told him that killing her was the only way he would ever see his kids again, KTVK reported. He also said that he did not intend to shoot Ledesma-Ramirez’s co-worker, explaining that she was “simply in his way.”

Mitchell reportedly said Ledesma-Ramirez was terrified that Alvarez “would do something to the children,” which she “did not want to happen.”

“Not only did a young mother lose her life that night, but multiple young people were also put in harm’s way and will have to live with the trauma of what they saw and heard due to the defendant’s callous actions,” Mitchell said in a statement. “In committing this offense, he altered many lives, but most of all, those of his own young children.”

Prior to Alvarez being formally sentenced, Ledesma-Ramirez’s parents addressed the court.

“She was an exemplary mother,” the parents said, per the release. “She guarded her children so much because they were her greatest treasure, but now she has left such a huge void in us.”

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