{"id":27079,"date":"2024-06-19T15:26:47","date_gmt":"2024-06-19T21:26:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/n-m-man-accused-of-imprisoning-abusing-71-year-old-man\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T23:51:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T05:51:11","slug":"n-m-man-accused-of-imprisoning-abusing-71-year-old-man","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/n-m-man-accused-of-imprisoning-abusing-71-year-old-man\/","title":{"rendered":"N.M. man accused of imprisoning, abusing 71-year-old man"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Matthew
Matthew Ruiz, 42, of La Plata is accused of imprisoning and abusing 71-year-old man.<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A La Plata man was arrested June 13 for the alleged elder abuse of a 71-year-old San Juan County man.<\/p>\n

Matthew Ruiz, 42, was charged with a fourth-degree felony abuse of a resident, a fourth-degree felony false imprisonment and a misdemeanor interference with communications.<\/p>\n

The charges are in connection to incidents that happened between June 1, 2023, and January 2024 when Ruiz was hired to be the live-in caregiver of Ray Barnes, who lives on County Road 4903, according to the affidavit for arrest warrant.<\/p>\n

Barnes, who \u201cis elderly and is unable to walk on his own,\u201d told San Juan County Sheriff\u2019s detectives that he was introduced to Ruiz through another caregiver, whom he identified as Tonya Shelby, the affidavit states.<\/p>\n

Barnes needed assistance from the caregiver with \u201cgoing to the bathroom and cleaning himself.\u201d He explained to investigators that \u201che wore (adult diapers) because he cannot get to the bathroom,\u201d adding that Ruiz would leave him in soiled diapers \u201cfor weeks at a time,\u201d the affidavit states.<\/p>\n

Ruiz reportedly \u201cwould refuse to clean\u201d Barnes, leaving him locked in a bedroom and allegedly \u201cwould utilize a garden hose from outside the residence and \u2018hose\u2019 Barnes down and leave him soaked and cold in his bedroom,\u201d the affidavit states.<\/p>\n

Investigators stated in the report that they found \u201cpossible water damage in the master bedroom\u201d where this reportedly happened, thus \u201cconfirming\u201d Barnes\u2019 statements.<\/p>\n

Barnes also told investigators that Ruiz reportedly \u201cpunched him in the face with a fist,\u201d when the two had a disagreement, and he reportedly \u201cthrew a fan\u201d at Barnes, causing an injury to the elderly man\u2019s wrist, which investigators stated they \u201cwere able to observe\u201d and the injury had scabbed over, the affidavit states.<\/p>\n

Barnes alleged Ruiz had \u201cthrown\u201d him out of his wheelchair, causing the man to hit his \u201clower back,\u201d according to the affidavit.<\/p>\n

In addition to the alleged physical abuse, Barnes told investigators that Ruiz not only locked the door to his bedroom from the outside, but also \u201cblocked his bedroom doorway with a table,\u201d and reportedly \u201cscrewed the table leg into the wall,\u201d so that Barnes \u201cwas unable to move the table,\u201d the affidavit states.<\/p>\n

Investigators stated in the affidavit that they located \u201cscrew holes and scratches on the wall consistent with something being (screwed) into the wall,\u201d and that the markings were on both sides of the doorway.<\/p>\n

Barnes hired a new caregiver in May, and the new caregiver along with Shelby reportedly confirmed to investigators that they knew the alleged \u201clack of care, imprisonment, physical and emotional abuse,\u201d suffered by Barnes at the hands of Ruiz.<\/p>\n

Farmington Police and San Juan County Sheriff\u2019s deputies served a warrant on Ruiz at 1:21 p.m. June 16 at Tomo Steakhouse, where the man was seated at a Hibachi table having lunch.<\/p>\n

When arrested, police reportedly located and seized 2.5 grams of meth in a baggie in Ruiz\u2019s front shirt pocket. He additionally was charged with a fourth-degree felony possession of a controlled substance.<\/p>\n

Ruiz is being held in the San Juan County Detention Center without bond or conditions of release until his preliminary hearings, which will be on June 26 in Farmington for the drug charge and on June 27 in Aztec on the abuse charges.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Matthew Ruiz was a live-in caregiver for 6 months before arrest<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27080,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-27079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27079"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27079\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":79678,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27079\/revisions\/79678"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27080"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27079"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=27079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}