A man who attacked a woman outside a Warminster fitness club, groping her and stabbing her repeatedly when she resisted, was sentenced today to serve 17 ½ to 35 years in state prison.

“This is a violent and cruel episode,” Bucks County Common Pleas Court Judge Rea B. Boylan told the defendant, Angel Ramos, before imposing the sentence.

Ramos, 49, had pleaded guilty on March 6 to multiple charges including aggravated assault, indecent assault and terroristic threats in the June 6, 2016, attack in the Center Point Place Shopping Center on West Street Road.

The victim, in her early 30s, was accosted shortly before 11 p.m. while sitting in her car outside Planet Fitness after a workout. 

The woman told police she was text messaging when her car door opened and she saw Ramos holding a knife. She said he leaned in and held the knife to her neck.

Screaming, the victim told Ramos to take her wallet. After threatening to kill her if she didn’t stop screaming, Ramos started kissing the woman and grabbing her breast, according to a probable cause affidavit.

When Ramos ripped her shirt, the woman screamed again and tried to grab his knife. Ramos responded by yelling, “You’re gonna die,” and began stabbing her in the head and neck.

The victim managed to break free and run back inside Planet Fitness.

The woman did not attend the sentencing, but Ramos apologized to her father-in-law and told Boylan that he was under the influence of alcohol and drugs at the time of the assault. “There’s nothing I can do; I’m sorry for this young lady,” he said.

Deputy District Attorney Kristin M. McElroy said an evaluation by the Pennsylvania Sexual Offenders Assessment board concluded that Ramos has an antisocial personality disorder and meets the criteria to be declared a sexually violent predator.

Defense attorney Niels Eriksen did not contest that finding, but noted that Ramos turned to drugs and crime only after his infant son accidentally suffocated while sleeping in a bed with the child’s mother.

“You had no help whatsoever in dealing with the death of your son?” Eriksen asked.

“No,” Ramos replied.

Ramos served extensive time in state prison for several drug-related convictions. After being released, he said, he stayed drug-free until 2012, when he relapsed after receiving opioid painkillers for injuries suffered in an automobile crash.

Ramos still faces rape charges in Philadelphia and a DUI charge in Montgomery County. He showed little reaction when Boylan pronounced the sentence.

“I’m 49,” Ramos had told the judge moments earlier. “I can’t recover from this. I’m done.”

The case was investigated by the Warminster Township Police Department.

Contact: Kristin M. McElroy, 215.348.6336, kmmcelroy@buckscounty.org  

Approved for release by Gregg D. Shore, First Assistant District Attorney.