The death of Elizabeth Ramirez was manslaughter in slow motion, cops say.
Her former common-law husband, Carlos Lozano, will finally face justice on charges that he shot her 22 years later.
Lozano allegedly shot Ramirez in the head on Nov. 29, 1979 – leaving her blind, unable to move, and never more than semi-conscious for decades, law-enforcement sources said.
The bullet finished its work in January, when Ramirez died.
The city medical examiner ruled the death a homicide – and suspicion immediately centered on Lozano, who was charged yesterday with manslaughter after he broke down and admitted pulling the trigger.
“I just always thought, where was the guy who did this. Is he still alive?” said Ramirez’s daughter Angela.
“And now that he’s arrested, I’m very happy.”
Lozano told cops the gun went off accidentally as he tried to fix it for a friend, sources said.
Angela Ramirez – one of Ramirez’s two children – disputes that tale.
She told The Post she clearly remembers the night her mom was shot – and that she saw a man who she now believes was Lozano come into their Hells Kitchen apartment, take a gun from a briefcase and open fire.
In the hospital that night, Ramirez told doctors she had been hit in the head with a frying pan.
She was treated and released – but underwent brain surgery days later.
She was never fully conscious after that, and has spent most of the last 20 years hospitalized in a haze of paralysis, blindness and dementia.
“He took away my privilege of having a mother,” said Ramirez, 26.