Kimon Burton-Roberson, Gang-Related Kidnapping and Murder, Delaware 2021

Wilmington Man Gets Life for Gang-Related Murder

A Wilmington man was handed a life sentence for his role in a gang-related kidnapping and murder. Kimon Burton-Roberson, 32, was one of three defendants sentenced in connection with the crime committed by members of the Shotgun Crips gang.

According to court documents and evidence presented at trial, the Shotgun Crips targeted the victim, a 35-year-old Wilmington resident, after he and Burton-Roberson became embroiled in a dispute. Shortly after midnight on July 21, 2021, members of the gang—including Burton-Roberson, Jamil Salahuddin, and Josiah Rivera—invaded the victim’s home.

The gang beat the victim with a tire iron and a pry bar, bound his hands behind his back with zip ties, and forced him into Burton-Roberson’s Jeep, which was being driven by Stephanie Bultes-Ramirez. The gang then drove the victim to Philadelphia, continuing to beat him on the drive. In Philadelphia, they picked up gang higher-up Dwayne Alexander, who directed the gang to an industrial park in Yeadon.

There, Burton-Roberson executed the still-bound victim by shooting him in the head with an assault rifle. After the murder, the gang tried to cover its tracks by, among other things, scrubbing the Jeep for forensic evidence and terminating service on the cell-phone numbers they had been using that night.

Jamil Salahuddin, 22, who helped abduct the victim out of his Wilmington home and beat him in the head with a tire iron, received a sentence of 17.5 years in prison. Stephanie Bultes-Ramirez, 27, who drove the vehicle in which the victim was transported from Wilmington to Philadelphia and ultimately to the murder scene in Yeadon, received a sentence of 10 years in prison.

The case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Delaware Violent Crime and Safe Streets Task Force, the Wilmington Police Department, the Yeadon Borough Police Department, the Pennsylvania State Police, and Delaware Probation and Parole. “This crime was utterly depraved, and these lengthy prison sentences reflect the egregiousness of the offense,” said First Assistant U.S. Attorney Julianne E. Murray.

Two additional defendants are awaiting sentencing in federal court—Rodney Chambers, whose sentencing is scheduled for December 22, 2025, and Dwayne Alexander, whose sentencing is scheduled for January 27, 2026. A sixth defendant, Josiah Rivera, is awaiting sentencing in the Superior Court for the State of Delaware. Rivera was not charged federally because he was a minor at the time of the crime.

Related Federal Cases