Estranged Husband Sentenced In Fort Meade Soldier's Murder

FORT MEADE, MD — The Army master sergeant convicted of killing his wife, who was a soldier stationed at Fort Meade, has been sentenced to the maximum punishment by a federal judge who called the murder "cold blooded and calculated.”Prosecutors say Army Sgt. Maliek Kearney, 37, had long been involved with a mistress, Dolores Delgado, and killed his wife, Karlyn Serane Ramirez, to escape an unhappy marriage.

Anne Arundel County jurors in August convicted Kearney of murder. The estranged husband of the slain Fort Meade soldier and mother received the maximum sentence of life in prison on Nov. 30 for his conviction on charges that he shot his wife in her Severn home, the Capital reports. Kearney pulled down his wife's clothes to make the killing look like a sexual assault, then placed their 4-month-old daughter in her arms and fled the state to establish an alibi for the murder. Ramirez and Kearney had separated in August 2015, and Ramirez had obtained a protective order through the Army prohibiting all contact between the couple.

Ramirez, 24, was found shot to death in her Severn home with her infant daughter, Kattaleya Vale Kearney, unharmed beside her on Aug. 25, 2015. Kearney was stationed at Fort Jackson, South Carolina, when his wife died, and he was reportedly on duty in South Carolina at the time his wife was killed, police originally said. But in October 2016, investigators testified that Kearney, with help from his then-girlfriend, Delgado, 33, of San Antonio, drove to Severn to kill Ramirez.

Kearney was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole, and ordered to pay $492,800 in restitution to the Ramirez family.

While Kearney said at his sentencing that he loves and misses his wife, federal Judge George L. Russell III said, “I don’t believe you.”

U.S. Attorney Robert K. Hur said in a news release, “Maliek Kearney cold-heartedly planned the murder of his wife and placed his four-month-old baby in her dead arms after shooting her several times at close range. The investigators and prosecutors painstakingly put this case together so that Kearney did not escape justice. This sentence ensures that Kearney will not be able to harm any other women. Hopefully, it will also bring the family of Karlyn Ramirez some peace that Kearney has been brought to justice.”

Delgado pleaded guilty to crossing state lines to commit domestic violence which resulted in a death, a federal crime. She said she burned Kearney's clothes and ditched the revolver in the Banana River in Florida; divers later retrieved the gun. She was sentenced in September to 17 years in prison, WTOP says, and tearfully told Ramirez's family she was sorry.

Kearney shot his wife three times late in the evening of Aug. 24, 2015, before driving 500 miles back to South Carolina to be at work the next morning in a move to provide an alibi he plotted ahead of time. Prosecutors said Delgado admitted buying gasoline to let Kearney travel to Maryland without stopping at a gas station and gave him the murder weapon.

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Prosecutors say Ramirez and Kearney allegedly had a rocky and unfaithful relationship. Ramirez obtained a protective order through the Army prohibiting all contact between the couple. Delgado, an Army veteran of Iraq, testified as a government witness that she had assisted Kearney in killing Ramirez. The Gazette reported Delgado testified she had a long affair with Kearney, which started before the marriage and continued after the wedding.

"He was planning to [go to Severn] and kill his wife if she didn't reconcile with him," Delgado testified.

Delgado lent Kearney her Nissan Altima, a less conspicuous vehicle than his Jaguar, she said, alongside her revolver. He left his phone with Delgado, who sent two texts while he was gone to establish an alibi, she testified, according to the Gazette.

Though she gave him a gun, Delgado said she didn't expect Kearney to kill Ramirez. "I believed there was some chance of Karlyn seeing Mr. Kearney and working things out," she said, the Gazette reported. "I told him that he wasn't going to do anything … that everything would be fine."

See more:

• Girlfriend Of Slain Fort Meade Soldier's Husband Pleads Guilty In Death
• Husband Killed Wife, Placed Baby in Her Arms, Fled Maryland: FBI
• Husband, His Girlfriend Charged In Fort Meade Mom's Murder (Update)
• Slain Fort Meade Soldier's Husband Stands Trial For Murder

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