WATERVILLE — An East Wenatchee man will serve 6 1/2 years in prison for the death of a 19-year-old found lying in a residential driveway last spring.

Jorge “C-Loc” Sanchez Sanchez, 21, entered an Alford plea to first-degree manslaughter, denying responsibility for the stabbing death of Osvaldo Ramirez last March but admitting a jury would likely convict him.

The sentence from Douglas County Superior Court Judge John Hotchkiss is the low end of the standard 78- to 102-month range for a defendant like Sanchez, who has no prior felony record. His attorney had argued for an exceptionally low sentence of one year, noting that Ramirez died after arming himself with a homemade wooden spear and seeking to avenge a bar fight that had taken place the night before.

Sanchez was initially charged with second-degree murder after Ramirez was found lying dead on his side the morning of March 27 in the 1300 block of Terrace Court, with stab wounds to his abdomen and lower back and minor injuries consistent with being struck by a car. He lay in a residential driveway, where he was discovered by the homeowner.

Friends of Ramirez told police they had gone by car to the East Wenatchee neighborhood late March 26 to confront Emmanuel Torres Galvez, 19, of Wenatchee, who had assaulted one of them the previous night at a Wenatchee nightclub, with the help of two others. Ramirez and another man crafted wooden spears from tree branches and brought them along to serve as weapons, according to police reports.

Carrying the spears and on foot, Ramirez and two other men approached the home where Torres was staying. When four men in the front yard charged them and a car parked nearby began driving toward them, Ramirez’s group ran back toward their own car. Ramirez was left behind when the driver and other passengers fled.

A homemade spear was found near Ramirez’s body. No eyewitnesses admitted seeing him killed.

Interviewed by police, Sanchez admitted seeing someone hit by a car but denied attacking Ramirez. But in August, Torres — accused of driving the car that hit Ramirez — pleaded guilty to three counts of third-degree assault in the case and agreed to testify against Sanchez. He’ll be sentenced Nov. 19.

A third person, Karina Ramos Sanchez, 19, was charged with rendering criminal assistance after police accused her of lying about Sanchez’s whereabouts the night of Ramirez’s death. Her case was dismissed the day after Sanchez entered his plea.

Arguing for a minimal sentence, Sanchez’s lawyer George P. Trejo Jr. of Yakima said Ramirez’s death that night resulted from mob action he and his friends took.

“Osvaldo Ramirez went out with his comrades looking for trouble,” Trejo wrote in a brief to Hotchkiss.

In his reply brief, Douglas County Deputy Prosecutor Eric Biggar said no one in Sanchez’s group suffered any injury from Ramirez or his friends, and Sanchez was seen carrying a knife when he emerged from the house to meet Ramirez’s group. “... He was just as much an aggressor in the incident as was Mr. Ramirez,” Biggar wrote.

Jefferson Robbins: 664-7123

robbins@wenatcheeworld.com