A set of Instagram photos is now sitting at the center of a serious courtroom fight in Albuquerque, where police and prosecutors say an 18-year-old showed off illegal guns and cash online. In a video report for KOB 4, reporter Emily Faith said a judge decided the teen will stay in jail, siding with the state’s argument that he’s a danger to the community.
The teen is Wyatt Ruiz, and Emily Faith reported that the initial criminal complaint focused on what officers say they spotted on his Instagram account. Police say one of the guns appeared to include a machine gun conversion switch, which prosecutors described as illegal because it turns a semi-automatic firearm into a fully automatic one.
Ruiz’s defense pushed back in court, and Emily Faith highlighted the key theme: the attorney argued this wasn’t about intending violence, but about “a social media trend type situation.” That line might sound like a modern excuse, but it also points to a real tension courts are struggling with – online clout culture colliding with real-world criminal laws…