KILLER TWIN
Sister’s shocking crime
Even as infants, identical twins Anna and Amanda Ramirez were inseparable. “If I put one in the bassinet without the other, they would start crying,” recalls their mum, Ivelisse Class. “They couldn’t be apart.” That closeness continued throughout their childhoods as they grew up in Camden, New Jersey, and into adulthood, where the pair both worked in the medical field and often spent their free time together. And so it was that on June 21, the 27-yearold twins were hanging out with a cousin and a friend at Amanda’s apartment in Camden’s Centennial Village. As the evening wore on, the group were laughing and drinking, even snapping a happy picture of themselves that Anna captioned ‘You know the vibe’ on Facebook at 3.43am. But just hours after Anna’s post, shortly after 5.30am, Camden County police responded to a 911 call at the complex. Officers discovered Anna outside Centennial Village with blood seeping through her clothes. A path of bloody footprints led them to the door of Amanda’s apartment, where police say they found Amanda with blood on her clothes and scratches on her face – and changing stories about what had happened to her sister. “Officers located the victim lying on the ground, and it appeared she had been stabbed,” the Camden County prosecutor’s office said in a press release.
“She was taken to Cooper University Hospital and was pronounced deceased at 6.19am.”
Hours later police arrested Amanda, charging her with one count of aggravated manslaughter. At press time she had not yet entered a plea. “It is important to remember that like anyone else charged with a crime, Ms Ramirez is presumed innocent,” Jennifer Sellitti, a spokesperson for Camden’s office of the public defender, which is representing Amanda, said in a statement.
For their part, friends and family of the sisters say they remain in shock. At a June 27 hearing, where Amanda was ordered to be held in jail without bail, they watched her sob at the defence table as she listened to the proceedings. “My daughter that’s in jail, she’s not a monster,” says Class, the twins’ heartbroken mum. Class says when she made eye contact with Amanda, “I told her that I love her.” Afterwards, family members filed out and prepared to attend the wake for Anna, who was buried the following day. “They loved each other,” Class says through tears.
“We don’t know what happened that night.”
While police have yet to reveal a motive for the stabbing due to the ongoing investigation, they say the alcohol-fuelled evening led to an explosive, physical altercation between the sisters. When police first arrived on the scene, they say Amanda told them she had seen Anna walking down a street looking dishevelled, so she picked her up and drove her home, where she collapsed, per police reports. Later, Amanda revised that story, saying that she had arrived at her apartment to find Anna bleeding on her front step. But when investigators questioned Amanda about dried blood in her ear and fresh scratches on her cheeks, she allegedly admitted having an argument with her sister and said that “she and her sister exchanged multiple blows”, a police report states. Amanda allegedly then told police that Anna came at her with a knife, and she stabbed her sister as they struggled. Though the reason the sisters were fighting has not been revealed by police, some news outlets have reported that Anna and Amanda were involved in a love triangle, fighting over the same man. But those reports have not been substantiated, and Class says she doesn’t believe them as each twin had her own boyfriend. But she also cannot fathom what might have caused the sisters to fight. Anna, a certified nursing assistant, and Amanda, a home health aide, supported each other in their careers and hoped to eventually become registered nurses together, Class says. As single mothers – Anna had three daughters and Amanda has one –they also helped each other raise their kids. “They were at each other’s sides when they gave birth,” says Class. “They took the kids out together, they drove each other to work. I never noticed any difference in them. They were a team.”
As she waits for answers, Class is also now tasked with raising her four young granddaughters, with help from extended family, who she says are supportive “because they know Anna and Amanda loved each other”. But even if she eventually learns what happened that night, she says she knows she will never find peace.
“When you lose a child, you don’t sleep,” she says. “You just wish this was a nightmare and you could wake up and see them walk in the door like they always would.”
“My daughter that’s in jail, she’s not a monster” —Ivelisse Class