Ross key player in feds' heroin case against city man

Mark Ross ... was working as DEA informant for more than a year and a half, including time when Eve Tarmey died.

CONCORD, N.H. - A Rochester man was convicted of multiple counts of heroin distribution in federal court Friday afternoon, thanks in part to another man charged by federal prosecutors in the fentanyl overdose death of 17-year-old Eve Tarmey.

Lorenzo Ramirez, 58, of Rochester, was found guilty of three counts of unlawful distribution of heroin and one count of unlawful possession with intent to distribute heroin, according to a press release from the Department of Justice on Friday.

After a four-day jury trial in the United States District Court for the District of New Hampshire, Ramirez was found guilty of making three sales of approximately 42 grams of heroin in Rochester in February and March 2015 to an undercover officer working with the United States Drug Enforcement Administration.

On March 4, 2015, after conducting a third sale to the undercover officer, Ramirez was arrested and found to be in possession of an additional 10 grams of heroin, which was packaged for redistribution, and $750 in cash.

According to information gleaned from court records in the case, that undercover officer was introduced to Ramirez by Mark Ross, 41, of Rochester, who was working as a paid DEA informant at the time.

Eve Tarmey

During the conversation Ramirez is told by Ross he was starting a new job, and Ramirez would have to be the undercover DEA officer's supplier.

Ross is now charged by federal prosecutors in the death of Tarmey, a Spaulding High senior, who died Oct. 17 inside a Rochester motel room she was sharing with her mother, Jazzmyn Rood, 41, of Rochester, and Ross, who was Rood's longtime boyfriend.

Rood, and another woman, Leslie Aberle, of Salisbury, Mass., also face federal charges in Tarmey's death.

Ross collected $2,000 from the DEA during their 17-month association.

Court affidavits from the Tarmey OD case indicate that Ross, Rood and Aberle were all high on heroin inside Ross' motel room when Ross gave some of the drug to Tarmey to calm her down after she became distraught over not meeting up with her boyfriend earlier in the day.

Tarmey snorted the fentanyl, a synthetic opioid 30 times more powerful than heroin and died a few hours later. Ross said in a court affidavit he thought the drug they had bought earlier in the day was heroin.

Ross and Aberle now face 20 years to life if convicted in federal court, while Rood could face up to three years.

Ross' association with the DEA lasted from from March 7, 2014, to Oct. 21, 2015, four days after Tarmey died.

Ramirez's sentencing, meanwhile, is scheduled for May 19. Ramirez, a citizen of Mexico, will likely face deportation after he is sentenced, according to the press release.