Sheriff: Tucson police recruit killed in drug rip targeting 'wrong house'

“It’s a rip crew. These guys were trying to rip somebody off they had a dope deal with, and they hit the wrong house,” Nanos told the Star in an interview. “There’s no evidence to suggest otherwise.”

He spoke out as online speculation has been building that the victims, Carlos Ramirez and his fiancée, both 23, had some connection to the perpetrators.

Investigators spent hours after the shooting searching the victims’ home and found no evidence of anything the killers might have been seeking, Nanos said.

“We searched for things like guns and money and drugs,” Nanos said. “It’s not like my detectives don’t think like other people do. The difference is, they don’t get on social media and say all the things they’re thinking.”

“Right now the investigation is pointing to the idea that these two knuckleheads hit the wrong house.”

Alex James Barnett, 33, and Santiago Jorge Rogers, 39, have been arrested and face first-degree murder and armed robbery charges. Court records say they had no known connection to either victim.

Barnett and Rogers both have long felony criminal records, including Rogers killing a friend in 2001 at age 12. 

Home invasions have long been a feature of Tucson’s criminal underworld. “Rip crews" have long geared up and burst into homes to steal money, drugs and guns from other criminals.

However, at times the criminal-on-criminal home invasions have spilled out into the civilian world. In 2009, the Star reported on a growing trend of home invaders either targeting the wrong house, or simply picking a house and invading it based on hopes it contained something valuable.

Victims reported long-term psychological trauma from the experience.

Ramirez was about a week away from graduating from Tucson’s police academy when he was shot and killed. His fiancée was working as a corrections officer at the Pima County Adult Detention Center, where Ramirez had also worked.

The fiancée, who is pregnant, has been released from the hospital, Nanos said.

“She is extremely scared, frightened. We’ve been providing her with security round the clock,” he said. “

“She took a horrible gunshot wound to heal from. That pain in and of itself is something. But the real pain she’s going to have to deal with for a long time is the loss of her fiancée and her baby’s dad.”