Elderly man sentenced to life for 1982 rape, murder of Karen Stitt in California
Gary Ramirez was identified using DNA evidence in 2022 as the man who raped 15-year-old Karen Stitt and stabbed her 59 times in Sunnyvale, California.
- Fifteen-year-old Karen Stitt was murdered in 1982 in Sunnyvale, California.
- Gary Ramirez, 78, was identified as the killer in 2022 through DNA evidence and sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 25 years.
- Stitt's family and friends attended the sentencing, expressing their grief and emphasizing that she has never been forgotten.
Karen Stitt was just 15 years old when she was brutally attacked, sexually assaulted and stabbed more than 50 times, her body left next to a cinderblock wall near the bus stop where she'd been waiting after visiting her boyfriend.
The 1982 murder of the Palo Alto, California, teen went unsolved for decades, but in 2022, detectives working the cold case identified Gary Ramirez as her killer. Now 78, Ramirez will likely spend the rest of his life in prison, the Santa Clara County Prosecutor's Office said in a May 12 release.
Ramirez was sentenced to life with the possibility of parole after 25 years. The Maui, Hawaii, resident pleaded no contest to the killing on Feb. 24. The office said the sentencing was possible through the work of "a continuous line of detectives" at the Sunnyvale, California, Department of Public Safety "putting their hearts and souls" into solving an "infamous crime."
'Continued grief' over a girl who's 'never been forgotten'
According to Santa Clara County prosecutors, family and friends of Karen Stitt attended the sentencing hearing "to express their continued grief and anger about this terrible crime, making clear that she has never been forgotten."
On a September night in 1982, Karen Stitt took the bus from her Palo Alto home to visit her boyfriend in Sunnyvale, about 10 miles away. She left her boyfriend around midnight, alone. Her boyfriend later told police he felt bad not going with her, but he was afraid of getting into trouble for being out late.
The following morning, a truck driver noticed her body in bushes and notified police. She had been sexually assaulted and stabbed 59 times, the cinderblock wall stained with her blood. The killer's blood and other fluids were on her body.
Her boyfriend was ruled out as a suspect in 2000 using a DNA profile. In 2021, a Sunnyvale police detective received a tip that her killer might be one of four brothers from Fresno. Gary Ramirez was identified as the likely source of the blood and body fluids left at the scene in April 2022.
“Today I am thinking of a young woman whose life and future were torn from her,” Santa Clara District Attorney Jeff Rosen said when Ramirez was convicted in February. “Karen Stitt would have been 57 years old today. Her murder was solved by forensic science, a remarkably stubborn detective, and a determined prosecutor."