Last month, a 22-year-old man claiming to be a West Village "neighborhood watchman" was arrested after he allegedly robbed and raped a 29-year-old woman who had lost her wallet. Ivan Ramos, 22, has now been indicted on two counts of rape and three counts of criminal sexual act. Prosecutors successfully lobbied the judge to increase bail after revealing new surveillance video that purportedly shows the incident: "The defendant savagely preyed on a vulnerable victim while posing as someone who wanted to help her," Manhattan DA Cyrus Vance said in a statement.
Ramos is accused of posing as a good Samaritan when he approached the 29-year-old victim on April 15. He first accompanied her to an ATM machine to get money with her debit card, but when she couldn't remember her pin, he took her down a stairwell on Perry Street and allegedly raped her and forced her to perform oral sex. Ramos has many, many priors: he's been arrested more than 20 times in the past five years on charges of robbery, assault, theft, burglary, false impersonation, weapons possession and grand larceny.
Bail has been increased from 300K to 500K thanks to the surveillance video. Ramos' lawyer Mel Reiss told reporters his client is "a hard-working family man, devoted to his family." Reiss claims this is a case of mistaken identity: "We're going to wait on the results of any DNA testing which I'm sure will vindicate him. My client adamantly denies any involvement in the crime."
