More about Ernesto

Stabbing victim 'got along with everybody'
By Brandon Stahl - Fergus Falls Daily Journal

Until Wednesday, no one in the small town of Pelican Rapids seemed to know the real name and identity of the man who was found stabbed to death early Sunday morning. Everybody in town, from his friends to his roommates to his coworkers, called him "Ernesto."

"He was so much fun," said one of his friends, Stacy Cruz. "He got along with everybody."

Cruz, along with another friend, Rikki Flores, met the 17-year-old Ernesto when he came to Pelican Rapids sometime in November after living in Iowa and Nebraska. When new people arrive in Pelican, Cruz said, they're often directed first to her and Flores.

"We gave him a room to stay in until he could get a place of his own," said Cruz. "We volunteer on helping out a lot of these people. We help anyone that comes to Pelican that comes to live. We help them buy food, find an apartment. It's just something we do.

"When he came to town, his friends said Ernesto knew only a sparse amount of English, had no other friends or family, and was living and working for $8.75 an hour cleaning the local West Central Turkeys plant, sending whatever money back to his family in Guatemala, keeping what little was left to pay for food and rent.

According to the Otter Tail County Sheriff's Department, Ernesto, whose real name is Noe Israel Morales Ramos, was also living in the country as an illegal alien.

He got his job with National Service Company, a firm that contracts to clean the turkey plant, said Cruz, a secretary at NSC, after he provided what appeared to be a Minnesota ID and a Social Security card. Both checked out, she said.

"If you have a Minnesota license and it's legal, we're going to hire them," Cruz said. "They're doing jobs that people around here wants to do. Nobody from our community wants that work. Nobody.

"Quickly, Ernesto befriended Cruz and Flores, who he worked with at West Central Turkeys -- Cruz as a secretary for NSC; Flores as a quality control inspector for Jenny-O, which owns the plant.

"He was always laughing, goofing and joking," Cruz said. "He was everybody's little kid brother.

"He was also generously helped his friends find work in Pelican Rapids, including his roommate, 18-year-old Juan Martin Morales, who up until Tuesday everyone knew as Miguel Alejando Ramos-Rivera.

Rivera, who is also suspected of being an illegal alien, is currently being held in Otter Tail County jail on $1 million bail after he allegedly stabbed Ernesto.

Cruz and Flores said the two friends grew up together in Guatemala and eventually made their way together to Pelican Rapids, though neither knew how.

"However they got here is how they got here," Flores said. "They go wherever they can make money to support their families.

"The two roomed together since March 15 at a house on 40981 State Highway 59, just south of Pelican Rapids. There, they would often fight, especially when they were off work on weekends. Once, Ernesto called Flores, crying after a fight.

"I said, 'You guys need to quit,'" he said. "I told them, 'I don't need to be getting these phone calls in the middle of the night over nothing.'"

A roommate who lived with Ernesto and Morales, Gabino Flores, said the two would often become violent when drunk. The roommate told police that early Sunday morning, Morales came downstairs from their bedroom and told his roommates that he killed Ernesto. Then he fled. He was found about eight hours later and arrested.

Though the two often scuffled before that, Flores said he never expected anything violent to happen between Ernesto and Morales.

"When [Morales] was around me, he was quiet. He hardly spoke. He was polite and respectful," he said. "I was shocked when I got the call to go to the house that night."

In the wake of the tragedy, Cruz and Flores are now trying to raise money to provide their friend with "a proper burial."

Though his family would prefer to send Ernesto back to Guatemala, they can't afford it. When his body is released from Ramsey County, where it was autopsied, it will be buried in Pelican Rapids.

But even that, his friends said, will be expensive.

"It would be $5,500 just to go to the cemetery, have a few words and have him buried," Cruz said.

Cruz and Flores are helping to organize a benefit this Saturday to raise money for a service and viewing.

Once a date is set, only a few of Ernesto's family members will be able to attend the funeral. The rest, Cruz and Flores said, can't afford the trip.

"The mother is taking it really hard," Cruz said. "His one sister is about to have a nervous breakdown."