The Waukesha case grew out of a Feb. 1, 2025, argument over whether a friend could stay overnight.
WAUKESHA, Wis. — Ronnie Fuentez has been convicted in Waukesha County of felony murder caused by battery after prosecutors said he beat his uncle, Adam Thompson, during a late-night argument over a sleepover, causing injuries that led to Thompson’s death days later.
The case matters because it shows how a brief domestic fight can become a homicide prosecution when medical complications emerge after the scene appears to end. Thompson did not go to the hospital right away, but later collapsed into a medical crisis that doctors identified as an internal brain bleed. After his death on Feb. 17, 2025, prosecutors upgraded the case from battery to felony murder. A jury found Fuentez guilty in February 2026, leaving sentencing as the next major court step.
Investigators said Thompson and Fuentez had shared a Waukesha apartment for about four years. Thompson told police the trouble started at about 10 p.m. on Feb. 1, 2025, when he told Fuentez that a friend could not spend the night and needed to leave. According to Thompson’s statement, Fuentez became upset and punched him in the head with a closed fist. Thompson said he hit back once in self-defense but then covered his head while Fuentez kept swinging. Thompson also reported that Fuentez insulted him during the assault and said he had wanted to hurt him since moving in. Thompson’s account placed the entire confrontation inside the apartment, with no weapon mentioned in the public record. Afterward, he said, Fuentez walked out and did not come back until the next morning.
The days after the fight became the core of the prosecution timeline. Thompson did not immediately call police, and public case summaries say he did not think he was seriously injured at first. He developed a migraine on Feb. 3 and took over-the-counter medicine. By Feb. 5, the pain had not gone away. While on the phone with his mother that day, he began struggling to speak in complete sentences. She suspected a stroke, came to his home, and drove him to Waukesha Memorial Hospital. Medical staff told him he had an internal brain bleed, and he was admitted to intensive care. A Waukesha police officer who met him there wrote that Thompson was conscious and able to talk, but had trouble finding words because of the bleeding. Even in that condition, Thompson identified his nephew as the person who hit him.
That hospital statement gave investigators a direct victim account before Thompson died. It also helped establish the timeline between the argument, the onset of symptoms, and the medical emergency. Public reports do not answer every question. They do not clearly say where the visiting friend was during the fight or whether anyone else in the apartment saw what happened. They also do not lay out the full course of Thompson’s treatment after he entered intensive care. Still, the broad outlines have remained consistent across court-based reporting: repeated punches to the head, delayed but worsening symptoms, a hospital diagnosis of internal bleeding in the brain, and Thompson’s death on Feb. 17. His obituary identified him as 46 years old and described a life rooted in Waukesha, where he had been born, raised and graduated from Waukesha West High School.
Prosecutors first filed a battery case, then changed it after Thompson died. Authorities said Fuentez was also out on bond in another matter when the fight happened, leading to a misdemeanor bail jumping charge because he was accused of committing a new offense while on release. Local reporting in June 2025 described the upgraded case and a scheduled court hearing in July. By February 2026, the matter had reached trial in Waukesha County Circuit Court. Reporting on the verdict said the jury returned guilty findings on Feb. 19 after a trial that began Feb. 17. The conviction was for felony murder caused by battery, not an intentional homicide count, a distinction that reflects the state’s theory that the death occurred during the commission of a battery offense.
Beyond the legal labels, the case turned on the weight of Thompson’s own words. His statement from the hospital captured both the ordinary start of the argument and the violence that followed. The details made the case read less like a planned crime than a household clash that spiraled beyond recovery. Thompson’s obituary later added a quieter picture of the man at the center of the case, saying he loved gaming, reptiles, his dog Boy and family gatherings. That contrast, between a routine home life and a deadly night inside a shared apartment, helped explain why the case drew wide attention once the jury convicted Fuentez.
Ronnie Fuentez’s sentencing is scheduled for April 27. Until then, the verdict stands as the latest formal step in a case that began with a family dispute on Feb. 1, 2025, and ended, in court, with a felony murder conviction more than a year later.
Author note: Last updated March 20, 2026.