By Henry K. Lee
The San Francisco Chronicle
SAN FRANCISCO — The only defendant in the torture of a Tracy teenager not to accept a plea bargain with prosecutors was sentenced Monday to life in prison with the possibility of parole.
Anthony Waiters, 31, was convicted by a San Joaquin County jury in November of nine charges, including torture and child abuse, for the treatment meted out to Kyle Ramirez, now 18.
The case drew national headlines after Ramirez used a trampoline to escape from a fenced backyard in December 2008 and sought help at a nearby gym.
He testified that he had spent more than a year in captivity in the home on Tennis Lane. He said he had often been shackled, had gone without food for long stretches, and had been beaten and branded with a hot baseball bat.
Waiters was the only one of four defendants to go to trial in the case. The other three — Michael Schumacher, 36; his wife, Kelly Lau, 32; and Caren Ramirez, 45, who was Ramirez’s former guardian and stayed in the couple’s home — accepted plea bargains in October that call for sentences of at least 30 years in prison.
Waiters was the couple’s next-door neighbor. He was sentenced in Stockton by Superior Court Judge Terrence Van Oss.
Copyright 2011 San Francisco Chronicle
All Rights Reserved