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Naomi Rhodus and Ryan Kevorkian were responsible for the 2012 abduction and torture of Michael S. and Barnes in Newport Beach, California. Michael ran a successful marijuana dispensary.
On October 2, two masked individuals broke into their home, tied them up, blindfolded them, and forced them into a van. Rhodus and Kevorkian, along with Hossein Nayeri and Kyle Shirakawa, were convicted of abduction and torture for money. Kevorkian was sentenced to over 12 years in state prison in 2021, as reported by AP News on May 28, 2021.
Whereas, his now divorced partner Naomi Rhodus (formerly Naomi Kevorkian) was found guilty of torture, burglary, aggravated mayhem, and misdemeanor. All charges against her, except for the misdemeanor were dismissed.
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Wicked Game: Devil in the Desert documents the complete span of crimes committed by Naomi Rhodus and Ryan Kevorkian. The ABC docuseries released on February 4, 2025.
What happened to Michael S. and Mary Barnes?
As per an ABC News article, published on February 4, 2025, Michael was a wealthy medical marijuana dispensary owner, living with his roommate Mary Barnes, in Newport Beach, California. On the night of October 2, 2025, two masked men broke into their home, armed with guns. They entered their bedrooms, tied them up, and blindfolded them.
"He slapped a piece of tape on my mouth, pushed a blindfold down over my eyes," she added, ""And then he zip-tied my hands, and he zip-tied my ankles together," Barnes had described.
Soon, the captives were pushed into a white van, and drove off, in the middle of the night. As per ABC News, Michael was soon threatened to hand them over, a ransom of $1 million. Though Michael was relatively wealthy, he revealed that he did not have that sum of money. He went on to offer the abductors $100,000.
The abductors refused to believe his statement and soon began to beat him violently. He was shot with a stun gun, and his skin was burned in multiple places with a blowtorch. Barnes described the scene as,
"He was gagged, so it was mostly just muffled grunts of pain as they were hitting him," she added, "And it just seemed to go on for a very long time."
The abductors believed Michael had $1 million hidden in the Mojave Desert. They drove him to a narrow area, forced him out of the car, and made him lie on the ground. One of the men stood over him while they tied a zip tie around his penis and cut it off. They then poured bleach on the wound and his body.
The masked men did not torture Barnes but rather abandoned both of them, while still being tied. As per ABC News, one of the culprits threw a knife near her, asking if she could find the knife, and cut the zips, so she could attain her freedom. Michael and Barnes were left in the desert, however, Barnes managed to put off her blindfold with her knees and find the knife. She said,
"It was just before sunrise, so there was just enough light that I could see it glinting on the knife. I was able to scooch over to it on my butt. And I have no idea how I did it. It must've just been pure adrenaline, but I cut the zip tie between my feet."
Barnes managed to flag down Sgt. Steve Williams, a former senior deputy officer from the Kern County Sheriff's Office. The law enforcement officer was driving along the Mojave Desert and detected Barnes screaming for help. She directed the officers to the place where Michael was lying in a wounded state. He was soon rushed to the hospital, where he survived after suffering from multiple injuries.
Naomi Rhodus and Ryan Kevorkian, along with Hossein Nayeri and Kyle Shirakawa were caught and found guilty
As per ABC News, Ryan Peters, a retired detective from the Newport Beach Police Department, teamed up with Homicide Prosecutor Matt Murphy and started an investigation to find out the true culprits behind the kidnapping. Murphy revealed that they started the investigation, without holding onto any particular concrete evidence.
When Michael was interviewed, he claimed he was nice to the people around him, had no enemies, and neither had any kind of affairs. The most concrete piece of evidence came from one of Michael's neighbors, who claimed to encounter a strange scene near the victim's house, before the abduction.
She revealed to the investigators that she had seen a white pull-up van near Michael's residence. Three men, dressed like construction workers came out from the van and placed a ladder near Michael's residence. The neighbor looked at it from her desk and thought the activity to be suspicious.
Hence, she noted down its number plate, and added to the investigators, that the white van, had a dent. The investigators traced the number plate, which took them to a medical marijuana business owner named Kyle Shirakawa Handley. Upon interrogation, Handley declined to say anything without his lawyer.
However, when Ryan Peters attained a search warrant for Handley's house, they found the same white van with a dent, with the same number plate.
"Then we go outside, and there are these trash bags up against his back wall," Peters added, "We slowly, methodically, kind of start going through these things. And what we're finding is that they're white towels with bleach all over them. We test these towels for blood and they're coming back positive."
Upon investigating the van thoroughly, they found a blue nitrile surgical glove, beneath the seat. However, when the DNA sample from the glove was tested, it didn't match Kyle Handley. After months of investigation, investigators found that the DNA sample matched with a man named Ada Hossein Nayeri.
As per the Los Angeles Times, Cortney Shegerian, the former wife of Ada Hossein Nayeri accepted of plotting the entire abduction. She testified of listening to Handley and Nayeri, of plotting the murder. She bought four burner phones for plotting the abduction and helped Handley to set them up.
The investigation led the authorities to two more culprits named Naomi Rhodus and Ryan Kevorkian, who were involved in plotting the abduction in 2012. As per a Daily Pilot article, published on March 25, 2022, Naomi Rhodus was found guilty of torture, aggravated mayhem, burglary, and misdemeanor. All, except the misdemeanor charges against her were dismissed.
It was in May 2021, when Ryan Kevorkian pleaded guilty to kidnapping and first-degree burglary. He was sentenced to 12 years and four months in the California state prison. Handley was found guilty in 2018 and was sent to a lifetime in prison.
After getting caught, Hossein Nayeri broke out from the Orange County Men's Central Jail in Santa Ana and tried to flee away to Iran. He was caught and was sentenced to lifetime imprisonement in 2019, without any chance of parole.
To know more about the kidnapping of Michael S. and Mary Barnes, watch Wicked Game: Devil in the Desert available for streaming on Hulu.
