Surveillance footage from the Shell gas station at 5405 W. Valencia Road, near Casino del Sol, showing Mr. Barnett and a second unidentified suspect at approximately 5:20 a.m. on August 19, 2026.
Authorities have named a suspect in the killing of a Tucson police recruit and are asking the public's help to find him and to identify two other people believed to have been involved.
A first-degree murder warrant has been issued for Alex James Barnett, 33, the Pima County Sheriff's Department said in a news release Thursday night. Prison records show he has an extensive criminal background.
Barnett
Carlos Ramirez, 23, a former corrections officer for Pima County who was days away from completing the academy to join the Tucson Police Department, was shot and killed about 6 a.m. Wednesday in the home he shared with his fianceé, a 23-year-old Pima County corrections officer, who was shot and wounded.
The couple shared a home in a Star Valley area neighborhood on Tucson's far southwest side, and their child was in the home at the time of the shooting.
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No possible motive in the shooting has been provided.
The Sheriff's Department sent out an alert to area residents' phones late Thursday night saying Barnett is bald with distinctive arm tattoos, and was last seen wearing a red shirt and black leather vest while riding a maroon 2020 Harley-Davidson motorcycle with Arizona plate DA466. He is considered armed and dangerous, it noted; "Do not approach. Call 911."
The Sheriff's Department also released two videos Thursday night of surveillance footage: One from the Shell gas station at 5405 W. Valencia Road, near Casino del Sol, showing Barnett "and a second, unidentified suspect" at about 5:20 a.m. Wednesday, minutes before the shooting in a nearby neighborhood.
The Pima County Sheriff's Department says this screenshot from a surveillance video shows Barnett at a gas station minutes before a Tucson police recruit was shot and killed at his nearby home.
The second video shows "a third, unidentified suspect" getting out of the vehicle believed to have been involved in the incident. That footage is from a parking lot near South Palo Verde Road and East 33rd Street at about 10:50 a.m. Wednesday.
The Pima County Sheriff's Department says these images from a surveillance video show Barnett, the named suspect in the killing of a Tucson police recruit at a gas station with a man who could also be involved in the deadly shooting that occurred minutes later.
The department said earlier Thursday that the alleged getaway car, a gray Acura MDX SUV captured on surveillance cameras, was found Thursday in a parking lot near South Palo Verde Road and East 33rd Street, south of East 29th Street.
Arizona Department of Corrections records show Barnett has been sentenced to prison repeatedly and was most recently released on Nov. 18, 2025, after serving almost a year for unlawful imprisonment. In that case, he was originally charged with aggravated assault, too, but pleaded guilty to the unlawful imprisonment charge, court records show.
Previously, corrections department records say, Barnett was convicted of burglary, theft, identity theft, weapons misconduct, auto theft, child or adult abuse, solicitation of dangerous drugs, and other crimes.
Of the 12 cases listed in corrections records since 2010, 11 are from Pima County and one is from Yuma County.
The Sheriff's Department asks that anyone with information about the suspects’ identities or locations, or any information that might help with the investigation, call 9-1-1, or 88-CRIME, the anonymous tip line.
Surveillance footage showing a third, unidentified suspect exiting the vehicle believed to be involved in the incident in a parking lot near S. Palo Verde Road and E. 33rd Street at approximately 10:50 a.m. on August 19, 2026.
