“Well folks, I’m about to get shot. Peace,” was 30-year-old Eric Ramsey’s last post to his Facebook wall around 3:15 a.m. Thursday, Isabella County Sheriff Leo Mioduszewski told CNN in a telephone interview.
Ramsey had abducted the student from CMU’s campus about 2.5 hours northwest of Detroit on Wednesday evening, then drove her to a home where he bound and sexually assaulted her, the sheriff’s department said in a news release.
After the attack, Ramsey put the woman back in the car, grabbed two cans of gasoline and began driving again, it said. When he told the woman he was going to kill her, she jumped from the car and ran to a nearby residence, where she knocked on the door and yelled for help, the release said.
A 14-year-old boy let her in and, after hearing her story, locked the woman, his younger sister and himself in the bathroom, Mioduszewski said.
As the woman was calling police, Ramsey poured gasoline on the house and set it afire before fleeing, the sheriff said.
Shortly thereafter, the children’s father returned home and doused the fire, which caused no serious damage, Mioduszewski said.
Police soon caught up with Ramsey, who led them on a chase through two counties, during which he rammed a state police trooper’s car, stole a sanitation truck and rammed two more vehicles, police said.
“It’s been real, bro, wish I could have hung with you once last time. Love you, brother,” Ramsey allegedly posted to a friend’s Facebook page around 1 a.m. Thursday, as the chase was continuing.
A couple of hours later, after hitting a deputy’s car head-on, Ramsey posted his final words, the sheriff said. Soon after, he was fatally shot by a deputy.
“We owe it to the public to find out what was the cause of this,” Mioduszewski said Friday. Police are meeting with friends and family to determine what was going on in Ramsey’s life, he said.
