Mankato man charged after alleged assault, drowning attempt
May 8—MANKATO — A 30-year-old man was arrested Friday for allegedly attempting to drown a woman in a Mankato hotel bathtub after previously being charged with trying to start her on fire in an incident in Colorado.
Jordan Craig Rue is facing five felony charges after police were called to a Mankato hotel and found a bruised woman clad only in a towel at 2:02 a.m. Friday. The victim told the responding officer that Rue, whom she has been dating for about 18 months, had tried to drown her in the bathtub of their hotel room and cover her face with a towel covered in what she believed to be drain cleaner.
The woman had bruises below one eye and near her elbow, which she said resulted from Rue elbowing her in the eye and kicking her in the arm approximately a week earlier. The victim also stated that the two were not supposed to be together because an order for protection had been issued in a pending case in Colorado.
That case, which police learned involved allegations that Rue had attempted to light the victim on fire, is one of "multiple pending cases" against him involving threats of violence, felony domestic assault, false imprisonment and a felony violation of an order for protection, according to a criminal complaint filed in Blue Earth County District Court.
In addition to those ongoing cases, Rue has been convicted of three domestic-violence-related offenses in the past three years.
In Friday's incident, the woman said she and Rue got into an argument in the hotel lobby because she did not want to go back to their room because she was "afraid that Rue was going to be mean to her." During the argument, he hit her in the head with a cellphone, according to both the victim and a witness in the lobby, and the woman went to stay at a friend's house.
She returned to the hotel later in the evening, found that Rue was still upset and went to take a bath. Rue then allegedly held her head under the water before spraying a towel with possible drain cleaner and holding it over her face. The victim said she was able to kick her way out of the bathtub and run into the living area where she found a large storage cabinet had been placed against the door, preventing her from fleeing the room. She then jumped out of the room's window and went to the front desk for help.
Police eventually located Rue at a different hotel and arrested him, according to the complaint. Rue's address in the criminal complaint is listed as a room in Mankato's Riverside Suites motel near the Highway 14-Highway 169 interchange.
The five charges filed against him involve domestic assault, a pattern of stalking conduct, stalking while having a history of domestic violence convictions, and violation of an order for protection.
