An Alcalde woman has been released from custody after being found not medically fit to spend any time in the Rio Arriba County Detention Center, after she was arrested as part of a year-long investigation into drug trafficking in the jail.
Rio Arriba County Sheriff’s Detective Manuel Romero sought a warrant for Iris Armijo’s arrest on July 8 on one count each of trafficking a controlled substance and bringing contraband into a jail.
Romero arrested Armijo on Monday and then Rio Arriba Magistrate Judge Alexandra Naranjo released her before she could be booked. Someone wrote on the warrant that she released Armijo, 41, “due to not being medically cleared per Judge Naranjo.”
What condition is so severe that she wouldn’t be cleared for the jail is unclear.
While she was not cleared for booking, no summons has been issued for her to appear for arraignment.
Romero wrote in an affidavit for an arrest warrant that he investigated drug trafficking in the jail for a year, between Jan. 12, 2024 and Feb. 16, 2025, and Armijo and her boyfriend, Bradley Abeyta, were two subjects of his investigation, along with jail staff, inmates and civilians.
Armijo came to his attention on Oct. 19, 2024, when another deputy texted him that jail staff found a package of drugs stashed under the sink in the women’s bathroom in the jail lobby, he wrote.
Jail Supervisor Samantha Salazar wrote in a statement, which Romero read, that Armijo came to the jail to visit Abeyta, 39. Then she came back, and told one of the guards that she lost her ID card in the main lobby. She eventually went into the bathroom for three minutes, then left the jail after coming out of the bathroom.
“Samantha Salazar mentioned Samantha Salazar was suspicious of iris Armijo’s unusual activity in the jail and conducted a shakedown of the female restroom in the lobby,” Armijo wrote.
When she checked under the sink, she found a package wrapped in balloons and paper towels. She brought the package into the jail’s control center, opened a balloon package, saw it was likely drugs, and called for law enforcement, he wrote.
Romero sent the packages to be tested at the New Mexico State Police crime lab, with results coming back for methamphetamine, cocaine, heroin and fentanyl, he wrote.
The following year, the late Sheriff Billy Merrifield asked Romero to investigate complaints of drug trafficking at Armijo’s house in Alcalde, after receiving multiple complaints from neighbors, and they conducted a few stakeouts, he wrote.
Then the biggest break came on July 3, when the Ohkay Owingeh Police Department called asking for some help on a case, where they had done a welfare check on a person slumped over in a car. Passenger Cecilia Gonzalez, during an interrogation, said she has been buying drugs from Armijo for the past two years, that she helped Armijo wrap drugs in packaging and helped get them sent to the jail through the mail, he wrote.
Boyfriend violates probation
Abeyta, admitted to probation violations in two Rio Arriba cases, on July 11, according to online court dockets.
He pleaded guilty in March to: larceny over $2,500, possession of burglary tools, tampering with evidence, trafficking and two counts of felon in possession of a firearm, with a three year sentence and credit for time already served, and a sentence suspended for five years on supervised probation, according to the plea deal signed by prosecutor Nancy Cortesi.
While he appears to have admitted violating his probation, no court documents have been entered to show what happens next.