By Kevin Hendricks, The Paper.
A caregiver paid roughly $5,000 a month to look after a Rio Rancho woman with developmental disabilities will spend the next 30 years in prison for the abuse and neglect that led to the woman’s death in 2023.
A 13th Judicial District Court judge handed down the sentence Monday, the maximum allowed under the caregiver’s plea agreement, the New Mexico Department of Justice announced. Charges included abuse of a resident resulting in death, false imprisonment and conspiracy to commit kidnapping.
Federal agents found the woman in a van near the U.S.-Mexico border in February 2023. She was severely dehydrated and drugged, with open wounds and bedsores so deep they exposed bone, according to the NMDOJ. She died that April.
“This case was especially egregious,” Attorney General Raúl Torrez said.
A co-defendant agreed in September 2025 to testify against the caregiver and serve five years in prison. Both defendants went back to jail in June 2025 after tampering with their GPS monitors and contacting each other in violation of their release conditions.
The two defendants owe a combined $3.3 million in restitution, including $2.5 million to the woman’s estate and about $861,650 to the state. The 38-year-old woman received care in Rio Rancho through the state’s Developmental Disabilities Waiver program.