Men Get Long Sentences For Drugging & Robbing Local Gay Bar Patrons, Killing Two

Three men who robbed and drugged Manhattan gay bar patrons, killing two people, have been sentenced to decades in prison. They were convicted of murder, robbery, burglary, and conspiracy back in February.

Manhattan District Attorney’s office made the announcement on May 21. Jayqwan Hamilton and Robert DeMaio will each serve 40 years to life in connection with the 2022 attacks, while Jacob Barroso will serve 20 years to life. They dosed their numerous victims with fentanyl—including 33-year-old John Umberger and 25-year-old Julio Ramirez, the two men who died due to the attacks—before stealing their phones and draining their online bank accounts, prosecutors successfully argued.

Two other men more tangentially connected to the incidents, Shane Hoskins and Andre Butts, accepted lesser guilty pleas last year and were sentenced to eight years in prison.

“Julio Ramirez and John Umberger were beloved by their friends and family and had incredibly bright futures ahead of them,” Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said in a statement. “Yet their lives were cut short by these defendants, who displayed a wanton disregard toward their victims.

“They left both men to die as they used their financial accounts to purchase clothes and sneakers, never once showing concern about the deadly consequences of their actions,” he added. “We will never be able to undo the tragic losses of Mr. Ramirez and Mr. Umberger, but I hope these significant prison sentences can provide some closure to their loved ones.”

The first unnamed man in the string of attacks was targeted by DeMaio and Barroso on March 18, 2022, outside of The Q NYC (a now-defunct gay bar that was located in Hell’s Kitchen). After going back with the man to the Union Square hotel where he was staying, they knocked him out with fentanyl-laced drugs, before wheeling him into his hotel room on a luggage cart. DeMaio and Barroso then reportedly stole the victim’s phone, fled to Brooklyn, and used the phone to make purchases on Apple Pay and Cash App; their victim only noticed all of this after he eventually woke up.

On April 8, Barroso and Hamilton targeted another unnamed man at The Q, accompanying him back to his apartment on the Lower East Side with one of the man’s friends. They similarly knocked him out with fentanyl-laced drugs, before pilfering his credit card. When the man later woke up, he discovered that Barroso and Hamilton had made purchases at the high-end stores Prada and Bloomingdale’s with his card.

Ramirez, the 25-year-old who was killed by the attacks, was targeted on April 21. This time, all three men met him outside of The Ritz Bar, a gay nightclub (still in operation) on West 46th Street. After providing Ramirez with fentanyl-laced drugs and taking his phone, they left him in the back of a cab at around 3:30am. He was later taken to a hospital and pronounced dead. Meanwhile, the three men used Ramirez’s online bank accounts to buy thousands of dollars’ worth of sneakers and clothing.

On May 14, DeMaio and Hamilton targeted yet another man they met outside of The Ritz Bar, and used his phone to make a $2,000 transfer from the payment app Zelle after drugging him. The unnamed man survived, but awoke to find his phone and wallet missing.

The 33-year-old Umberger was killed by DeMaio and Hamilton on May 28, after they met him at The Q. Prosecutors say they accompanied him back to his apartment building, drugged him, and left him “motionless and incapacitated” on his bed. They used his accounts to buy $2,000 worth of clothing and sneakers at various stores. Umberger was found dead four days later, after his mother asked the police to do a wellness check on him.

After announcing the sentences, DA Bragg highlighted an initiative concerning payment app security that he began last year. His office noted that he’s “called on” CashApp, Zelle, and Venmo to adopt measures including: making the adoption of two passwords a default security policy, lowering limits on daily transfers, requiring wait times and secondary verification for large monetary transfers, and adopting better monitoring policies.