Is Walmart Responsible for This Young Mother’s Murder?
Francine Ramos, a mother of three, was killed with ammunition purchased at an Easton Walmart.
Francine Ramos, Trevor Gray and Edward Ketrow were all gunned down and killed last July 5th, allegedly by three men on a random shooting spree in Easton and Allentown, Pennsylvania. And now the families of those three victims have filed a wrongful death suit against retail behemoth Walmart, claiming that the store and its employees were wrong to sell ammunition to an underage and intoxicated suspect.
The families filed the suit last week in Philadelphia Common Pleas Court naming the individual store in Easton, Pa., the chain, associated companies, and employees who were either in management positions at the store or involved in the ammo sale itself.
The suit claims that shooting suspect Robert Jourdain was only 20 years old and drunk when he purchased the ammunition allegedly used in the shootings. The ammunition was used in a handgun, and in Pennsylvania, you must be 21 years of age to purchase handgun ammunition. But, as a Walmart spokesperson pointed out in a statement, that ammo can actually be used in a rifle as well, and you don’t have to be 21 to purchase rifle ammunition. (The gun owners we spoke with said that while technically correct, this type of ammo is almost always used in a handgun.)
According to the suit, Jourdain had been out drinking with his cousin for at least four hours prior to walking into the Walmart store at 2:56 a.m. and purchasing 50 Winchester .38-caliber bullets. After walking out of the store with the ammunition, he got into a car with the two other suspects and loaded the ammunition into a gun. Less than 30 minutes later, say prosecutors, the shooting began.
Police quickly located the vehicle used in the shooting. Inside the car, investigators found a Walmart bag containing the partially used box of Winchester ammo, the handgun used in the murder, and 12 spent Winchester .38-caliber shells, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit (below) accuses Walmart of negligence among other offenses and seeks unspecified damages. Bail was denied in the murders, and Jourdain remains incarcerated pending trial.
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