Miami-Dade Police Director Freddy Ramirez hospitalized after shooting himself, police sources

Miami-Dade Police Director Alfredo “Freddy” Ramirez was hospitalized Sunday night after shooting himself, according to multiple law enforcement sources.

Ramirez, 52, a Miami-Dade Police lifer who rose through the ranks of the largest police department in the Southeast U.S. and who has filed to run for County Sheriff next year, was in Tampa attending a Sheriff’s Association conference this weekend.

Though information was scarce, law enforcement sources with knowledge of the incident said Ramirez had pulled over somewhere along a highway between Tampa and Miami when he shot himself. It wasn’t immediately clear what led to the shooting.

“He’s in the hospital and they’re working on him,” said Steadman Stahl, president of South Florida Police Benevolent Association. “Our prayers are with his family right now. We don’t know exactly what happened.”

Miami-Dade Police issued a brief statement at 2 a.m., saying they had been advised by Tampa Police that Ramirez had suffered a “critical injury.” The agency said the incident is being investigated by the Florida Highway Patrol and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

“We understand he is currently undergoing surgery. We ask you to please keep him in your prayers,” the statement read.

Police did not say where the shooting took place. Sources said police in Tampa confronted Ramirez after some type of altercation, but they believe the shooting took place after Tampa police had left. Ramirez had been attending the Sheriff’s Summer Conference, the largest yearly event for the Florida Sheriff’s Association, with his wife.

Ramirez, a Democrat, announced in May he was running for sheriff in 2024 to try to retain his role as the county’s top law enforcement official. He was named police director in 2020 under then-Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez. Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava handed Ramirez a further promotion by 2022, overseeing the police department and Miami-Dade Fire Rescue as interim chief of public safety. Levine Cava later made the appointment permanent.

He joined Miami-Dade Police in 1995 and worked his way up from patrol duty to deputy director after working at the side of former Director Juan Perez, before he was named to the top post. He was raised by grandparents who fled the Fidel Castro regime and his parents in Hialeah, according to his biography in sheriff’s campaign literature.

In 2015, one of Ramirez’s predecessors, Robert Parker, committed suicide behind his North Miami-Dade home, six years after he retired. Parker, who also rose through the ranks, was the first Black to be named police director.