Crime & Safety

Red Bank Woman Asphyxiated; Estranged Husband and Alleged Murderer Paralyzed, Authorities Say

Oscar Prior-Ramirez, charged in the murder of his estranged wife and mother of the couple's two children, currently in an undisclosed hospital.

On the day the Monmouth County Prosecutor’s Office revealed the official cause of death of Viridiana Beltran-Gomez, a law enforcement official close to the case said her alleged murderer and estranged husband is currently paralyzed, laying in a bed without movement in his extremities in an undisclosed hospital.

Beltran-Gomez was reported missing May 13 after leaving her job at Siena Grille with her estranged husband Oscar Prior-Ramirez. It wasn’t until this past Saturday that authorities discovered her body, buried about 100 feet from mile marker 119 in Aberdeen on the Garden State Parkway.

First Asst. Prosecutor Christopher Gramiccioni said Thursday that Beltran-Gomez died of homicidal asphyxiation, meaning that air to her lungs was intentionally cut off. He could not say whether or not the 26-year-old Red Bank resident was smothered or strangled.

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Prior-Ramirez, a 31-year-old Eatontown resident, has been in trauma care in an unnamed hospital shortly after police pegged him as a potential suspect in Beltran-Gomez’s disappearance. Gramiccioni confirmed that Prior-Ramirez was in a hospital under the watch of law enforcement, though he would not comment on the extent of his injuries.

A law enforcement officer connected with the case, who declined to be named, confirmed that Prior-Ramirez was paralyzed from injuries sustained prior to his apprehension. Both the law enforcement source and Gramiccioni declined to say how Prior-Ramirez suffered his injury, though both said it was not the direct cause of physical police involvement.

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Prior-Ramirez was charged with Beltran-Gomez’s murder following the discovery of her body Saturday. Calls to area hospitals for the status of his health were met mostly with confusion. A nurse at Jersey Shore in Neptune, the only hospital in the immediate area with facilities able to handle injuries like those suffered by Prior-Ramirez, said he was not listed as a patient there.

Authorities are still mum on specific details of the incident. The only information revealed thus far is that Beltran-Gomez was last seen leaving Siena Grille in Red Bank, the place where she had worked for but three days, with her estranged husband. She was reported missing shortly there after.

Gramiccioni declined to say how authorities were able to discover her body buried off of the Parkway saying only that the course of the investigation lead to information that the body may be there.

It is unclear if a weapon was used in Beltran-Gomez’s murder.

The couple had two children, small boys ages 4 and 7. The children were living with Beltran-Gomez and her family at their Bank Street home in Red Bank. Gramiccioni said the children are currently living with the family, though he declined to say where.

Beltran-Gomez’s Bank Street home is still occupied, and strollers currently sit on the porch, though no one answered the door Thursday morning.


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