Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - MOM-OF-8 SHOT DEAD CONFRONTING DOPERS TRYING TO SELL HER KIDS WEED

Episode Date: August 21, 2024

Teenagers have been arrested in connection with the death of a mother of eight, who was gunned down after a confrontation with suspected drug dealers. Blanca Velasco noticed a blue Toyota sedan parked outside her home for an extended period. Feeling suspicious, her daughter Maria Ramos accompanied Velasco down the driveway to investigate the unfamiliar car. In the street, the men in the car claimed they had come to deliver an “order” to Velasco’s 16-year-old grandson and flashed a marijuana vape pen. The two women argued with the men, prompting the blue Toyota to speed away. Determined to keep the dealers from returning, the mother and grandmother got into their own car and followed the Toyota for two blocks. Suddenly, the Toyota screeched to a stop, and Blanca Velasco stopped just behind it. Maria got out to approach the car, and before retreating across the street, she pepper-sprayed the occupants. A man in the backseat, armed with a gun, got out and chased Maria down the street before opening fire. Blanca pulled closer to the Toyota in an attempt to shield her daughter, who was trying to take cover from the gunfire. As Blanca turned back toward the Toyota, the shooter re-entered the vehicle and aimed the loaded gun at her. Panicked, Blanca sped away with the blue Toyota in pursuit. Blanca eventually lost the Toyota in traffic and returned to search for Maria but couldn’t find her. Then, she spotted her daughter lying on the sidewalk in a pool of blood. Joining Nancy Grace today: Phillip Dubé  - Court-Appointed Counsel, Los Angeles County Public Defenders: Criminal & Constitutional Law, Forensics & Mental Health Advocacy Dr. Jorey Krawczyn – Police Psychologist, Adjunct Faculty with Saint Leo University; Research Consultant with Blue Wall Institute, Author: Operation S.O.S. – Practical Recommendations to Help “Stop Officer Suicide”  Tom Smith – Former NYPD Detective, Co-Host of the “GOLD SHIELDS” Podcast; FB & Instagram: @thegoldshieldshow Dr. Jan Gorniak – Medical Examiner, Clark County Office of the Coroner/Medical Examiner (Las Vegas, NV), Board Certified Forensic Pathologist Rachel Swan - Staff Writer, San Francisco Chronicle; X: @RachelSwan See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I Heart Podcast. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. A mom of eight, let that sink in. A mom of eight shot dead, executed on the street. Because why? She confronts dopers trying to sell weed to her children. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us. Just before school starts again, Maria Ramos, 33, brings her eight children on a visit to their grandmothers in Oakland, California. Blanco Velasco's home is full of bubbly energy while she hosts both Maria and her other daughter's

families. The children are excited for back-to-school shopping with their cousins. We've all lived through that, the excitement of back-to-school, getting ready, getting new outfits, getting the notebooks, the pens, the everything. That's what was happening. How can that seemingly idyllic moment go so wrong? And then in an eerie premonition, this mom of eight is talking about her plans to move her family, her children,

along with her mom for a better life, to a better area where they can have a yard and a garden in the back. Listen. In recent years, Maria Ramos has become extremely close with mom, Blanca Velasco. Maria often talks of moving to a larger home in the Central Valley with a big yard for the children and a vegetable garden. Maria is determined to provide a better life for her eight children. Maria and Blanco put a timeline on their dream, planning to move to Merced together next year. But mommy couldn't

make it happen fast enough. You know, many of us juggle working and children. She has eight children to take care of. Her big plan was to move those eight children to a home, a neighborhood where she could have a front yard and a garden in the back, but she couldn't get there fast enough. This is where it starts. Listen. Around 2 p.m., Blanca Velasco notices a blue Toyota sedan parked outside her home for an extended period of time. Suspicious mom of eight, Maria Ramos, walks down the driveway along with her mom to investigate the unknown car. There in the street, the men in the car state they've come to sell Velasco's 16-year-old grandson an order and flash a marijuana vape pen. The two women argue with the men and the blue Toyota speeds away.

With me, an all-star panel to make sense of what we're learning right now, but first to Rachel Swan joining us, investigative reporter, writer with the San Francisco Chronicle. Rachel, thank you so much for being with us. Tell me the first part of this story. Tell me about the mom realizing, spotting that blue Toyota and going

down to confront it and then following it with the grandma. Thank you so much for having me. Yeah. So, so basically this what this was, you know, three people who were apparently involved in a business together where they did deliveries of, I'll say, illegal substances to people's homes. OK, hold on. Wait, Rachel, as you know, on Crime Stories, everybody, including me, is on the hot seat. Did you just say that the guys in the car were in a business together? Well, you know, not that much is known right now, but we know that they were making a delivery for, you know, a web drug delivery service where, you know, they had a website advertised. I assume, you know, illegal substances that they would deliver to your home, you know, sort of like. Well, let me get my head around this. Yeah. Rachel Swan, it's everything you're saying is correct.

I just have a hard time digesting it because, you know, to Philip Dubay, high profile defense attorney in the California jurisdiction. What? It's like delivering a pizza or Chinese. You go to a website, you type it in, and you get drugs. And that's okay? Well, first of all, I think they're mischaracterizing it. It wasn't drugs. It was vape pens, okay?

That's what the paraphernalia is. Vape of what? Marijuana or tobacco, whatever. But you've got to understand minors having marijuana no i mean if you're snoop fine go for it but philip dubay look okay so mom of eight those are eight children most of them are minors what is it legal in your jurisdiction for minors to have marijuana? It's an infraction. Basically, it's like a moving violation. Infraction. So for a minor to have pot, it's an infraction. I'm not talking about you.

You can have a big doobie right now for all I care. But for a minor, it'll be a cold day in H-E-double-L that some a-hole pulls up and tries to deliver pot to my child. That's not happening. So you're telling me that's absolutely okay to give an 11 or 12-year-old marijuana? No, not at all. But I think there's a little more to the story here. I think when mom rushed that car, she brought like a little canister of pepper spray and she maced the kids in the car. So if that's the case, that under California law is an assault with a deadly weapon. And here you have mid-traffic, some car pulling up, mom spritzing everybody in the car. They feel like

they're being attacked. If I were defending these kids, it would be a self-defense, defense of others type situation. Not to say that mom had it coming and not to victim shame here. Because that is what you're making it sound like. So mom is trying to scare away dopers from her children. They take off. She follows them to tell them to stay out of her neighborhood. She goes up to the car, sees a gun, then sprays a little pepper spray. I would too. If I saw a gun in the car, yes. If I had the pepper spray with me, yes. But you're making it sound like it's self-defense on the doper's part. Well, first of all, you're assuming that that's how it played out.

You know, it was widely reported that you're assuming it's not. No, I mom went up there and spritz them all because she was angry rather than finger wag and yell at them for being in the neighborhood and selling these devices. Oh, sorry. Did you just land on planet Earth? Did you crawl out of an egg? Wait, you had a mom, right? A human mother, correct? Yeah. Yeah. And she never went, don't do that. That's wrong. She never did that to you? Not once? Not with pepper spray in her hand. No, she used the belt. You made her sound like the devil from hell. She finger wagged. What mother? You know what? I can't hear you right now. Tom Smith, can you help me? Help me. Tom Smith joining me, former NYPD detective, co-host of the Gold Shield

podcast. And what that is, is true life crime with the detectives, the investigators, the cops, the forensics that actually work on that case, past or present. Gold Shield Podcast, Tom. No offense to Philip Dubay. He is a high profile defense attorney with the Public Defender's office. Nothing wrong with that in LA. And he seems to think that mommy is the devil. She's Beelzebub because she, with her mother, the grandma chases down the dopers and fusses at them and wags her finger according to him. So she sees a gun in the car, sprays pepper spray and runs off. And what do they do? Chase her down and shoot her dead. I mean, you and I both know Tom Smith. I know you didn't get your law degree, but you know all about self-defense. And when someone is running away from you and you pursue them and shoot them, you do not have a claim of self-defense.

What were you afraid of? Pointer? Her index finger? Really? No, absolutely right. It doesn't equal. And she went up there defending her kids and trying to make a better life for her kids. And these criminals, and that's exactly what they are, they had a gun in the car protecting

their business. And what did they do? And the criminals today, what they do, they shoot first and they worry about everything else later. That's exactly what happened. If you see the timing of the video, she got up there and immediately he jumped out and started shooting. All right.

That's what happened. Guys, a mother of eight, a mom of eight is visiting grandma and is brutally executed after she confronts drug dealers who had targeted her children with weed. Yes, that's what happened. Now she has a little, uh, finger size canister that fits on your keychain of pepper spray? He has a gun. That's bringing a knife to a gunfight. That's I slap you and you shoot me with an Uzi. What more do we know? Listen. Blanca and Maria hop in Velasco's car, determined to intervene and keep the dealers from ever returning. ladies follow behind the toyota for two blocks when suddenly the toyota screeches to a stop blanca stops short behind them and her daughter maria gets out to approach the car it's then that mom of eight maria

quickly turns and runs across the street away from the toyota joining me right now um esteemed psychologist dr jory cross and faculty saint St. Leo University consultant at the Blue Wall Institute, an author of Operation S.O.S. Dr. Jory, if I may call you that, you know, I hear Philip Dubé and he's doing what he's trained to do. That's why he wins so many cases, because somehow in about three sentences, he twists this thing around to make it mommy's fault. Help me out here. I think we've got to have a different perspective of this, and that deals with the individual shooters. You know, we can look at personalities, but when you have two people or more acting in concert, this socialization or group think takes over.

That's the best way that I can describe it. And we're seeing more and more of this across the country. Police officers involved in shootings and in all kinds of different violent altercations. We're rising to a new level of violence. Rachel Swan joining me, investigative reporter, staff writer, San Francisco Chronicle. Rachel, how was this caught on video? Well, my understanding is that this was captured on a neighbor's camera because, you know, everybody has these door cameras now, Nest Cam. So, you know, the police are able to get warrants for all this video now and collect it from neighbors. You know, the investigation is in its early stages, but I would imagine they have multiple videos, at least one, as we can see, very clear one. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. crime stories with nancy grace a perp in the back seat gets out armed with a gun and chases mom maria down the street before

opening fire blanca pulls closer to the toyota trying to shield her daughter who is now trying to take cover from the gunfire when blanca turns back toward the toyota the shooter gets back inside and runs the loaded gun on grandma blanca in a blind panic blanca speeds back toward the Toyota, the shooter gets back inside and runs the loaded gun on Grandma Blanca. In a blind panic, Blanca speeds away with the blue Toyota hot on her tail. So the grandma is terrorized as well. She sees the gun and takes off, thinking her daughter, Maria, has run away. And she circles back to find the worst. Listen. Blanca eventually loses the teens in

traffic and feels it's safe to go back for Maria. Back on Hilton, Blanca can't seem to find Maria and assumes her daughter is still hiding. Then she spots Maria lying on the sidewalk in a pool of blood. Blanca rushes to help Maria, telling her to breathe and hang on for her children as she calls 911. Imagine that going back to get your daughter who has eight children of her own to raise thinking that she's hiding. And if you look at that video carefully, you see the perps actually start firing at the vehicle, the gray SUV with grandma and mom in the car. Watch this. Watch it. Mom gets out. She sees what's up. She's sees, she sprays the pepper spray. They're chasing. There you go. The gun and it's not over yet.

Then he fires at grandma, chases down mom, shoots her, then fires on grandma. Grandma circles back to get her daughter only to find her dead in a pool of blood. Begging her to hang on for her eight children, she calls 911. Joining me now, a renowned medical examiner with the formerly Clark County Office of the Coroner. That's Vegas. Never a lack of business there. Dr. Gorniak, thank you for being with us. Explain to me, how was it that mom of eight Maria could bleed out so quickly there on the sidewalk? Well, it looks like from the video that she was shot even before she got to the sidewalk,

just based on her gait as she's kind of running, but more limping. So I believe that she got to the sidewalk, just based on her gait as she's kind of running, but more limping. So I believe that she got shot even before she got to the sidewalk. So she could have been shot in the chest. So that's not going to be an immediate death and she can bleed out there. I know she was shot multiple times. So if she shot, say in her head, that could be the blood in her chest. Obviously some of the blood will be coming out of her body, but most of it will be stayed inside. And unfortunately, she bled out on the sidewalk. Terrible for her mom to find her. But I want to go back about the delivery of drugs. We still had a lot of drug overdoses during COVID when the world shut down. And I think that's where the quote unquote business of delivery came into play because people were getting their drugs

delivered to them because obviously they weren't going out and getting them off the street. So I believe the delivery of drugs, the business of, what do you call it? What's the door dash, right? So dope dash started during COVID because we still had plenty of people dying of overdoses. So that probably this business sprung from that time. We are hearing unconformed reports that mom of eight, Maria, was shot in the back. If that's true, Dr. Jan Gorniak, a medical examiner, explained to me how she would have died so quickly when her mother, the grandma circled back. She was already in the last throes of death. She was gone. The mom begging her to stay alive, you know, calling 911. They couldn't get there fast enough. So how would a shot to the back cause her to bleed out so quickly? Did her lungs fill up with blood? How does that work? Well, depending on where the shots were, there are multiple. It could have gotten the lung, but most people don't realize too

that the main artery in your body, the aorta, is towards the back. So depending on the direction that the bullet went, it could have clipped her lung and her aorta. It could have went, depending which side it's going, left to right, right to left, that it got the heart. And that would be a cause for her to die so quickly. So Dr. Gorniak, she would have been shot either in the back or a side shot to the torso, possibly a shot to the arm that goes then into the chest. Correct. You're absolutely correct. There could be, we call it a through and through. So in and out of the arm and then into the chest. Correct. You're absolutely correct. There could be, we call it a through and through. So in and out of the arm and then into the chest. So, and it looks like she shot on that, that right side as she's facing the car. And then as she's running away, you'll see, she might've been shot right there too, but just to see her gait, it's like,

she wasn't running as normal as you would think someone was. And plus, I see that parked car over there. So she was, she was unfortunately in, in, in open, you know, open target for, for this person to, to, to shoot. A mother of eight gunned down in the street. And to make matters worse, they find out mommy is shot multiple times. Listen. Oakland PD arrives within minutes, finding Blanca still clutching Maria, who is suffering from multiple gunshot wounds

to her back and struggling to breathe. Cops fight to keep Maria conscious, but by the time paramedics arrive, Maria is gone. Blanca tells police they just wanted to keep the teens from returning and manages to tell them the car's license plate number. So she is in fact shot multiple times, a mother of eight, just trying to keep dope dealers out of the neighborhood and away from her own children. You know, I've heard many, many stories, Dr. Jory Crawson,

of moms seemingly getting superhuman strength and, you know, confronting attackers, risking their own life to save their children. And that is exactly what mom of eight, Maria, did here. She tried to take on dopers. Yeah, I've got to give her credit for the courage she showed, you know, confronting them. Even if it was just going to be, in her mind, a verbal altercation, she still, you know, jumped right into that fire like a mama lion protecting her cubs. Oakland PD canvases the neighborhood and locates surveillance footage that captured the entire shooting.

Plainclothes officers track the blue Toyota sedan to a home on Hilton Street. The shocking discovery that the thugs in the blue Toyota selling dope were teens, including 19-year-old Isaiah Gomez, who is detained and questioned. Hours later, the two 16-year-old passengers in Gomez's car are also arrested. Cops then recover a gun that matches the shell casings found at the scene. Well, they may call it the shocking discovery that the perps are teens. The shocking discovery for me is that there is a mother of eight shot multiple times on the street who bleeds out and dies with the grandma, her mother, cradling her, begging her to live. And why?

Because the mom of eight, Maria, dares to take on dope dealers who turn out to be teens. Okay. Question to you, Philip Dubé, high profile defense attorney. Maybe I'm missing something here, but does the fact that they're teens somehow change the fact that Maria, a mother of eight, is dead on the street? Oh, no, not at all. I mean, these kids are just as culpable. So the only question is, where are they going to go? Are they going to go into the juvenile justice system, or will they be marched upstairs into adult court? And these kids could not have picked a better jurisdiction. You're calling them kids. You're calling them kids.

Teenagers. Isn't one about to turn 20 years old? Hold on. Rachel Swan joining us from the San Francisco Chronicle. Isn't Isaiah Gomez the driver? Isn't he about to turn 20? Yeah. Well, he's 19.

So he is technically an adult, you know, under the law. But all teenagers. Okay. Hold on just a moment. Rachel, is Gomez the driver? He is the driver. He is a driver. And Rachel Swan, let me understand something. What is he charged with? What's the charge on the driver, Isaiah Gomez? And I should say, actually, he is allegedly the driver. He hasn't been convicted of anything. He is charged. Okay, hold on.

Rachel, we're not in a court of law. Look around, you're in a studio. You see the video. Okay. We know who's driving. But okay. The alleged driver. You win. You win. The alleged driver. Of course, he's a driver. But I'll pretend I'm in front of a judge, the alleged driver. What is the charge against the alleged driver, Isaiah Gomez? Felony accessory after the fact. So that's not murder. That is accessory. That is allegedly helping, you know, conceal the shooter, basically helping him flee from the crime.

Rachel, do you just want to say allegedly one more time and just get it out of your system? I'm always going to say allegedly, you know. Okay, I'm pulling your leg. Until someone's convicted, I'm going to say allegedly. Hold on. But seriously, on this topic, let me understand something. Tom Smith joining me. You know, I know what Dubé is going to say because he's like programmed.

And I'll deal with him in just a moment. But Tom Smith joining me, former NYPD detective, co-host Gold Shields podcast. Tom, why is this bass-ackwards? Because if you and I, this is a tired one, but I'll use it because it makes sense. Go into a bank and I say, okay, we're not going to shoot anybody. Right. And you go, absolutely not. I just want the money. We go in, you take out an Uzi and spray the place. I'm like, what did we just not say? We're not shooting anybody. Guess what? I'm charged with murder. So why is the adult in the car and his, as Gorniak said, door dash drugs.

Why is he not charged with murder? Felony, murder, felony. The underlying felony is the aggravated assault. I don't care if he didn't pull the trigger. That is not the black and white letter of the law. Just like I'm going to get charged with murder because you shot the bank teller. Yeah, I'd be charged with murder. And here's why. Here's my part. He had an opportunity to drive away. If you watch that video, he closed the door before the victim's car got there. He could have very easily just driven away and gotten out of that area. He chose to stay so his guys that are in the backseat of that car could take care of business.

He waits for the driver to get back. He waits for the shooter to get back in the car and then takes off and they hide out. And here is another thing, Tom Smith. You know what? Let me try this one out on Philip Dubé, a defense attorney. Dubé, as we all know under the law, there is explicit intent where I say, Philip Dubé, I'm going to shoot you dead. And bang, I do it. That's explicit. I state it. Then there is implicit intent where I don't say anything. I sneak up behind you and shoot you in the back of the head and you die. My actions implicitly prove I meant to kill you. In this case, you have the only adult in the car, Isaiah Gomez, delivering dope in a residential neighborhood, two children. The mom chases after him with grandma as the driver, and she's the wingman.

They chase down the dopers. He's got a guy in the back seat with a gun, And he stops the car and lets the shooter get out, pull off a couple of rounds, shoot mommy, and then take off. He's part of it. Why is he not charged with felony murder, underlying felony ag assault? It's like a law school exam. But what happened was back in January of 2019, California changed the felony murder doctrine where aiders and abettors cannot be held accountable for the underlying homicide unless they were the actual shooter intended to kill or they acted in reckless disregard for human life. So it's going to be a tough call for a jury to say that he was in on the murder. Now, he obviously was there to deliver vape pens.

Why is he driving this guy around with a gun? Well, that's a different question. Doesn't mean that he was in on a killing of this particular victim. You got to understand this was a very unplanned sort of spontaneous act. Car pulls up mid-traffic, gets out with pepper spray, and then boom, the gun goes off. It's not as if this whole thing was rehearsed and preplanned. Nobody knew she was going to come up on them like that. And if he did not know that the guy in the back had the gun. Hold on just a moment.

Dubé making the argument that the mother of eight is the bad guy in this scenario. Let me ask you a question, Philip D. Bay. Do you have a gun on you right now? No. Oh, why? Because you don't plan on shooting anybody today, right? Or at least not in the studio. Correct.

I don't have a gun either because I'm not planning to gun down. Well, not now anyway. Jackie's sitting over there. When you show up with a gun to make drug deliveries, I think the intent is clear. If anybody messes with you, they're going to get shot. And this guy, the only adult in the car, he is the one, pardon the comparison. He's driving this car. He's literally driving the car. And without him, this wouldn't happen because the

others don't have a car to drive. He is the one running the show. He's more than an aider and a better. This is his plan. Not under California law. Under California law, he's only liable for the underlying felony, which is constructive possession of a gun, you know, or accessory after the fact, which, by the way, only carries three years here as a felony. I mean, in theory, you could plead him out and let him go do his three years at halftime and he's done. He can move on with his life. The actual shooter is the one who's in big trouble. Unless they can show that that driver was in on

it, had the intent to kill, or acted in reckless disregard with actual indifference to human life, he is not liable for the murder itself under our abrogated felony murder doctrine out here. Units responded. They found the young woman suffering from wounds that provided aid, she unfortunately passed away. And within minutes, our patrol team and our special resources team sprung into action, identifying the vehicle, locating the vehicle, and then quickly taking three suspects into custody within the next 12 hours. I don't know how difficult it really was to find them because grandma had a license tag and she gave it to police. That was tracked back immediately

to a location on Hilton Street, not far away. And there it was, the blue Toyota sedan, i.e. four-door. It's reminiscent of how cars very often help you find your killer. Of course, there's those times where you've got the car and you still don't find the killer. You have to be hit over the head with the car. Like in Long Island's serial killer case, Rex Heuermann, who's responsible for at least five women's death and emphasis on at least, and would just bury them along Gilgo

Beach so he could pass by them every morning on the way to work. He had his Chevy Avalanche no longer in production into production, I think in 2013. His Chevy Avalanche was spotted by multiple witnesses and it was parked outside his house the whole time. But it wasn't put together. Two and two necessarily did not equal four in that case. So he could continue killing women. In this case, Oakland PD follow up on the tag. They find the blue Toyota four door and they immediately get the adult in

this scenario. But listen to this. All that hard police work is for naught. One of the 16-year-olds is released and not charged in the killing, while the other is charged with murder. That teen remains behind bars at the Alameda County Juvenile Hall. It has not yet been decided if he'll be charged as an adult. The driver, Isaiah Gomez, says he's not guilty to accessory after the fact and is released on bond, ordered to wear an ankle monitor. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. I'm going to go out to Rachel Swan. Rachel, is this correct? One of the teens is released and not charged.

The adult is released with nothing but an ankle monitor. And the third one is looking at being charged as a juvenile. So he'll probably get out if he does time at all in two years. Did the adult in this scenario actually walk out with nothing but an ankle monitor? Well, I mean, there are actually some other conditions, but, you know, I think he, I believe he but um you know i think he i believe he also has to do a few i believe he also has to do some programs um you know um so there are some programs like what don't shoot mothers of eight dead on the sidewalk what kind of program does he have to do because normally programs are enforced at sentencing. If memory serves me, there's a jobs program, but I mean, there's,

there's usually like, you know, So he takes part in gunning down a mother of eight and we're going to help him find a job. We're putting him in a jobs program. That's his punishment. I mean, I, I do. If, if memory serves me when I looked at the court documents, there were a couple other conditions in addition to the main one was that he has to wear a GPS monitor, which we sometimes call an ankle bracelet. So he's out of jail now. He has pled not guilty, as he said. He has to appear back in court and he will face a trial.

And he has to wake up every morning and make his bed and brush his teeth. OK, what is wrong with this scenario, Dr. Jory? Yeah, well, I mean, you have to look at, you know, the the the governance of the population. Society has changed, not for the better. I mean, you know, you look at this violence and by design, you can look at this group working as a business, the driver, the adult. The younger ones are going to carry the weapons and do the enforcement because just what you're seeing, they're not charged as adults. Here in Florida, I can remember a time when we had seven 12-year-olds booked for first-degree murder. They were actually hired in gangs to kill rivals. Okay. So that, I mean, that's a social cultural shift, a major one.

When you look at the average- Now hold on just a moment, Dr. Jory Croson, you're absolutely correct, but I want to get to Tom Smith very quickly, jumping off what you just said. Tom Smith, former NYPD, Tom, it's the oldest story in the book. I remember the first case felony case I ever had. I got sent over to juvenile to find a witness. I'm like, uh, what? I want a seven-year-old witness, but okay. I went over there. It wasn't the witness. It was the defendant was a little boy. And this is how it works. Adults use children and teens because they'll get the most they can get is five years. That's the most they can get in juvenile. They'll probably do one to two years in a dormitory setting.

So if that, and that's highly unlikely. So adults, like the adult here, gets children or teens to hold the dope and the guns. Why? Because they'll go, the adult will go to jail for 20 to life. The teen will be out in a matter of months and get right back out on the street. As Krausen was saying, this is one of the oldest stories, the oldest plans in the playbook for drug lords and dope dealers. Use teens, use children while you supervise them so you don't go to jail. Right. And here's the other thing. The criminals today know the criminal justice system and policies and laws better than anyone. They know what they can get away with. They know who they can use to get away with certain crimes.

And this is a perfect example of that. They know the laws in California are lenient. And what's going to happen to them? Absolutely nothing. They get an ankle monitor and a court date later on down the line. Caught on video, the horrific moment, a mother of eight, just 33 years old, is brutally executed. Why? She confronted the dope dealers trying to sell her children weed. Listen. Blanca Velasco is speaking with several media outlets to keep Maria's name in the news. Velasco hopes the media attention will help get justice for her daughter's murder.

Velasco is now taking care of Maria's eight children and is struggling to explain what happened to their mother. She told KPIX. The 15, the 13, and the 11, they know that mom is gone. The other five, I haven't had the courage to tell them. That's where our friends at K-Pix and more. Blanco Velasco is speaking out about her daughter's murder, hoping for change in Oakland. Maria Ramos' shooting is receiving increased media attention as the mom of eight was shot in broad daylight while she was just trying to protect her

children. Velasco detailed Maria's last comments for NBC Bay Area. I started rubbing her and told her, breathe Lupita, you know we still need you. You have eight kids, they still need you. That from our friends at NBC Bay Area. I was just thinking about her original statement. The 15, the 13, and the 11-year-old, they know mommy's gone. The other five, I haven't had the courage to tell them yet. The other five children don't even know their mom is dead. It's not the first time that a mother has been attacked right in front of her children. Listen. You've got a mom and her three boys going to an afternoon dental appointment. You've got traffic on the road.

And Mrs. Bigelow is trying to move to her right to get out of the way for an emergency vehicle that's trying to pass. She apparently cuts off Jeremy Webster, a 23-year-old man. He then follows her, terrorizing this family as they go down the road. So just following mom and her three little boys wasn't enough. Listen. Jeremy Webster follows Megan Bigelow into the parking lot and blocks in her car. Webster and Bigelow exchange heated words outside their cars. Webster then retrieves a gun and shoots Megan in the back and head. As Megan's sons try to check on their mother, Webster shoots

Vaughn, 13, and Asa, 8. Webster shoots another bystander before taking off and heading to his work shift. Vaughn dies in the parking lot. Megan, Asa, and the bystander survive their injuries with extensive medical care. What is wrong with these people? Shooting at moms and even children, this time in the parking lot of the dentist office? And more. Joanna Clunan is taking her son Aiden to kindergarten, driving down a busy freeway when Marcus Ares cuts her off.

Clunan flips Eric the bird and moves away from him, but Ares follows her. Clunan hears a loud noise, then Aiden, six, complains that his stomach hurts. Aiden is shot by Marcus Ares, finally identified through tips based off the description of his Volkswagen Golf Sport Wagon. Perez is charged with murder and girlfriend, Wyn Lee, who was riding with Perez, is charged as an accessory.

Opening fire on mommy and then ending up killing a six year old child. To Rachel Swan joining us with San Francisco Chronicle, what's next? Are we waiting to find out if the juvenile who pulled the trigger is getting his milk and cookies in Juvie Hall? You know, we don't really have access to the 16-year-old accused shooter's court records because he is a juvenile. So none of that's public. So honestly, I won't know. No one will know. We wait as justice unfolds.

Thank you to all of our guests for being with us. Nancy Grace signing off. Goodbye, friend.