Share and Follow
Background: Waukesha Memorial Hospital in Waukesha, Wisconsin (Google Maps). Inset: Ronnie Fuentez (Waukesha County Jail).
A teenage boy in Wisconsin beat up his uncle — who was also his roommate — after being told he couldn”t have a friend sleep over at their home, police say, and the victim has since died from his injuries.
Ronnie Fuentez, 17, was originally charged with battery — but that was later upgraded to murder when the victim died. On Feb. 5, a Waukesha police officer was called to Waukesha Memorial Hospital for a report of a domestic violence attack that occurred four days prior, according to a criminal complaint. The officer reported seeing the victim, who has not been named, awake and conscious in a hospital bed. However, while the man could speak, it was a struggle “due to internal bleeding in his brain.”
Still, the victim persevered, telling the officer that it was his nephew, Fuentez, who hurt him on the night of Feb. 1. They had lived together for about four years.
Love true crime? Sign up for our newsletter, The Law&Crime Docket, to get the latest real-life crime stories delivered right to your inbox.
At about 10 p.m. that night, according to the complaint, the victim said he was in an argument with his nephew because he didn’t allow him to have a friend sleep over, which “caused the defendant to get upset.” The victim instructed Fuentez he needed to tell the friend to go home, which reportedly caused the nephew to start yelling.
Punches were then thrown.
Fuentez hit the victim in the head area with a closed fist, the victim maintained, before he retaliated with a similar punch “in self-defense.” When the victim put his hands up to cover his head, Fuentez “continued to punch him with a closed fist” while yelling “p— boy.”
The suspect is said to have immediately left the residence after the fight and returned the next morning. It is unclear what happened to the friend.
At some point, as the victim later told police, Fuentez said to him, “I’ve wanted to f– you up since the first day I moved in.”
The victim did not contact the police nor go to the hospital in the subsequent three days. Two days after the fight, on Feb. 3, he felt a migraine in the afternoon, but after taking over-the-counter medication, he said he felt better.
Two days later, however, the migraine persisted. And then a particularly troubling event occurred.
The victim stated that late in the morning on Feb. 5, he was speaking with his mother on the phone when he “began to struggle with speaking in complete sentences.” His mother believed he was having a stroke and drove over to check on him, ultimately taking him to the hospital. Nurses there told him he had an internal brain bleed, and he was placed in the intensive care unit.
It appears that Fuentez’s alleged crime on Feb. 1 took place while he was out on bond after being released for an unrelated crime the previous September. As a result, hw also faces a charge of misdemeanor bail jumping because he “did not comply with the terms of his bond,” police said.
The victim died in late May, per WITI. Fuentez is due in Waukesha County court on Saturday.