Jury Deliberates In Husband's Fort Meade Murder Trial

SEVERN, MD — Prosecutors say an Army master sergeant who had long had a mistress killed his wife to escape an unhappy marriage, while defense attorneys claim the mistress pushed for the death of Karlyn Serane Ramirez so she could finally have Sgt. Maliek Kearney, 37, all to herself. Anne Arundel County jurors are deliberating after testimony concluded this week in his murder trial.

The estranged husband of a Fort Meade soldier and mother faces a maximum sentence of life in prison if convicted on charges that he shot his wife in her Severn home, pulled down her 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, 37, 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, Dolores Delgado, 33, of San Antonio, drove to Severn to kill Ramirez.

Kearney allegedly 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.

Kearney is charged with traveling across state lines to commit domestic violence resulting in a death, The Baltimore Sun reports.

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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."

Delgado pleaded guilty to crossing state lines to commit domestic violence which resulted in a death, a federal crime, the Gazette reports. She said she burned Kearney's clothes and ditched the revolver in the Banana River in Florida; divers later retrieved the gun.

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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Article image Karlyn Ramirez, courtesy of Anne Arundel County Police