Troubled indigent missing since leaving his possessions along Healing Waters Trail last April

William “Will” D. Waltman hasn’t been seen since April when he left his clothes and his Medicaid card, apparently his only identification, along the Healing Waters Trail on the south side of Truth or Consequences.

His mother and sister in Texas fear the psychologically troubled and homeless man may have drowned himself in the Rio Grande. But so far no body has been found, say police who have added his name to a national bulletin of missing persons.

Waltman, who would have turned 43 on November 28, grew up around Fort Worth, Texas, and had a fairly normal life as a teenager. He graduated from the “great books’ curriculum of St. John’s College in Santa Fe and for a while drew a six-figure salary as a software developer in Seattle and other places, said his mother Lynn Waltman. 

But gradually he began to exhibit signs of mental illness. “Loud noises bothered him and he couldn’t stay in a room with a lot of people,” his mother said. He became severely paranoid and suspicious of others, and indicated he was having issues with addiction, she said.

About four years ago, he returned to the Fort Worth area to live with his mother, but soon went back to New Mexico and communicated with his family only sporadically by email, usually from public libraries.

According to the New Mexico courts website, Will Waltman has been arrested 10 times on minor charges since early 2023 in Santa Fe, Taos, Los Lunas and Sierra County. The cases included shoplifting, disorderly conduct, concealing identity, breaking and entering, criminal damage to property and criminal trespassing, plus warrants from other states (Texas, Colorado, Wyoming and possibly Utah, according to his sister Katherine Aultman). He spent a few nights in jail but ultimately he was released each time.

In a Sierra County Magistrate Court hearing on several previous charges on April 26, 2024, Judge George A. Lee questioned Waltman’s competency and ordered him to be held in jail pending a hearing before a district judge after he “threatened to kill himself in open court.” It is not clear when and why Waltman was released. His public defender lawyers in these cases, Thomas Guerra of Santa Teresa and Jeffrey Clarke Lagan of Las Cruces, were not available for comment. 

Lynn Waltman said many of her son’s offenses stemmed from trying to find a place to sleep at night.  On April 26, 2024, Truth or Consequences Police Sergeant Rafael Marin arrested Waltman on a charge of criminal damage to property after a resident in the 900 block of Date Street reported that a man had damaged her tarpaulin privacy fence during the night. After observing a video of the intruder on the resident’s phone, Marin observed a man fitting the description at Tractor Supply. Told he was videoed cutting the tarpaulin, Waltman said “he wasn’t trying to hurt anyone or cause any trouble; he was just trying to keep warm,” Marin wrote.

In the last case involving Waltman on the state website, on February 4 of this year, Sierra County Sheriff’s Sergeant Alejandro I. Carreon charged Waltman with criminal trespassing after he was found sleeping in a cabin that is sometimes rented in the village of Winston. After he was told to leave the cabin, he went to a building next to the church. Told to leave there, he got into the Winston General Store through a back door and then to another property in Winston. Later that day, another deputy drove Waltman to Truth or Consequences “for his safety due to the high number of (residents) of Winston becoming more upset with Waltman entering several properties without consent,” Carreon wrote. 

Police have issued an arrest warrant for Waltman on the last case. He is described as being 6 foot, 2 inches tall, weighting 140 to 165 pounds, with blue eyes and dark brown hair.