July 25, 2023
Warning: This post contains mention of self-harm and sexual abuse. Reader discretion is advised.
Readers who are not up to date with the story so far can refer to the first and second post about the case. The first post was published when 25-year-old Rudy Farias was discovered unconscious outside a church in southeast Houston, TX, after being reported missing in 2015 when he was just 17 years old. The second post details the revelation that Mr. Farias had never actually been missing, but had been hidden at his mother’s home for a staggering eight years.
Today, we will be discussing updates in the case, including the details of a recent interview Rudy himself did with KRIV.
In a 28-minute interview published July 12, 2023, Rudy Farias spoke to reporters for the first time about his eight year ordeal. Coming across as understandably fragile, with a shaking voice often on the verge of tears, Rudy corrected the information previously released through media outlets and told the story in his own words.
When asked if he was kept secretly locked in his family home with no one but his mother for the last eight years of his life, Rudy said that he was describing the situation as Stockholm Syndrome, explaining that although he was not physically shackled to the home, he was mentally unable to leave, no matter how desperate he was to do so.
At night, the young man would work his mother’s job, twelve-hour shifts, he said, for which he only received $60 of the total pay check per week.
When family members would come by to visit his mother, Rudy was forced to hide from them, not make any noise and stay hidden. He described hearing his family talking and laughing in the other room and wanting nothing more than to scream that he was there too, but feeling completely powerless and unable to do so. Rudy had no social life during this time and no one to talk to besides his mother. He did look after his grandma, who would tell people that Rudy was present in the home, however, she was not believed due to her having Alzheimer’s and other health issues, and her claims were brushed off.
Rudy told interviewers that all he wanted was a life and family of his own, including his own job and car, but said that his mother forbade him and said that he would be in trouble with police if anyone was to discover that he wasn’t missing. He described being constantly “filled with negativity” and made to fear the consequences of what his mother insisted would happen if he were to surface.
Regarding the claims of activist Quanell X of a potential sexual-abuse element of the case- Rudy Farias said there was no sexual abuse in the relationship between him and his mother. He did confirm that his mother made him sleep in her bed and occasion and “crossed boundaries.” Quanell X was present at the police interview with Rudy when the young man was initially found.
Farias said: "I used to have to sleep in her bed sometimes, I don’t remember why, just next to her. It wouldn't be anything sexual or anything like that. I wouldn't lie about that because there's plenty of people who need honest truths when it comes to those things, and it just muddies the water to lie about those types of things. That's why I said the media, they like to twist my words and confuse things, I never said anything bad about her in that regard, but you know, just, boundaries she would push or make me uncomfortable. I would say 'stop' and she would say 'oh why! Why! What did I do? I didn't do anything wrong!' And I would be like okay..okay..you didn't do anything wrong, just, leave it at that, push my boundaries if you want, do whatever you have to do.”
"She didn't force herself on me or anything like that. It wouldn't be anything like, I would need to get a rape kit or file a police report. It would never be anything like that, just, just, stuff that really made me uncomfortable."
Rudy Farias revealed additional details not previously reported in the media, including how he would violently self-harm with torn up Coca-Cola cans after the passing of his brother, whom he said was a father figure to him. He said that through his life his biological father had not been there for him and instead he had stepdads who would come and go. The passing of his brother sent him into a deep depression.
He said that before he went missing, he had been given a speeding ticketing and his mother would use the citation to make him believe he would be arrested.
When asked if his mother profited from his disappearance, Farias admitted that he had heard about a GoFundMe and wondered where the money raised to "find him" actually went. In 2012, three years before he was reported missing, Farias had appeared in another interview during a period of time in hospital where he had a tumour removed from his heel. "That was irrelevant. I think originally all this started because she wanted me to fake take a bottle of Tylenol or sleeping pills and she wanted to pretty much fake me going to the hospital and she pretty much forced me to go into the ER." Farias said his mother told him to act as if he had overdosed. When asked why his mother had hatched such a plan, he said he didn't remember, but believed it happened around the time he was in school and had been self-harming after losing his brother.
Sprinkled through the interview was talk of "corruption of the mind through nanobots and the flu vaccines," and corruption through "colours, the media online and the people." “It confuses us,” Farias told interviewers. He also expressed difficulty in making online friends.
When asked if he was still talking with his mother, Farias said that he was not, and did not want any contact with her. He added that she "keeps trying to come around" but was firm in his stance that he did not want a relationship with her. As a parting message to his mother, he said, fighting tears: “Just leave me alone and let me live my life. Just let me be happy, I’m happy now, I’m working on it.”
Mr. Farias has denied having any willing part in his ordeal.
Sources: [X]
October 15, 2024