Governor signs $1B spending boost, vetoes pay for judges - By Morgan Lee Associated Press
New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham signed a $1 billion annual budget expansion for state government into law on Wednesday to shore up spending on public education, health care and infrastructure while boosting salaries for bureaucrats, state police and public school educators.
The $8.5 billion general fund budget boosts spending by 14% for the fiscal year starting July 1, with pay increases ranging from a $15 minimum hourly wage for public employees in state government and schools to 16% salary hikes for state police.
The bill funds a 7% raise for all school workers and employees at most state agencies, and many school teachers and counselors will get higher raises because of increased minimum salaries at various career stages.
At the same time, the governor vetoed a separate $50 million wish-list from legislators for small projects, ranging from a hay bailer to money for a youth symphony and debate programs, arguing that the bill circumvented a standard vetting process and could lead to waste. She declined to sign a major pay increase for high court justices and state district court judges, without comment.
Under the budget plan, annual spending on K-12 public education would increase by roughly $425 million, or 12%, to nearly $3.9 billion. Annual Medicaid spending would increase by roughly $240 million to $1.3 billion, extending post-partum care for a year, as the federal government winds down pandemic-related subsidies to the program that gives free health care to the impoverished.
Lujan Grisham, a Democrat running for reelection in November, highlighted state investments that boost teacher salaries, provide tuition-free college and teaching degrees, boost spending on pay for law enforcement and underwrite construction of a retirement home for military veterans in Truth or Consequences.
"This budget makes transformative investments exactly where they're needed: from historic raises for New Mexico educators and growing the country's most expansive tuition-free college program to creating a new fund to hire public safety officers," Lujan Grisham said in a news release. "We are taking full advantage of this unprecedented opportunity to strategically and meaningfully build upon our progress to lift up every New Mexico family."
The annual state spending plan from a Democratic-led Legislature relies on a windfall in state government income linked to surging oil production and prices, along with federal pandemic relief. The state would still end the fiscal year in June 2023 with more than $2.3 billion in estimated general fund reserves — a financial cushion that is likely to grow amid record setting market prices for U.S. crude oil amid a U.S. ban on Russian oil imports.
On Tuesday, the governor signed a tax relief package worth $530 million in its first year, including $250 rebates.
Confronting a deadline at noon Wednesday to approve legislation, the governor signed a criminal justice bill that expands the ranks of state district judges, boosts retention pay for municipal police and sheriff's deputies, and bestows million-dollar death benefits for relatives of police killed in the line of duty.
Legislators assembled the bill amid outrage over a record-setting spate of homicides in Albuquerque, while balking at proposals from the governor and prosecutors to ban pretrial release for people accused of certain violent and sexual crimes.
Instead the bill expands surveillance of criminal defendants as they await trial with 24-hour monitoring of ankle-bracelet tracking devices. And it sets out requirements for crime reduction grants that pursue alternatives to traditional prosecution and incarceration and expands intervention programs to rein in gun violence.
Native Americans fret as report card released on 2020 census - By Felicia Fonseca And Mike Schneider Associated Press
Plans for the 2020 census were set well in advance to ensure Native Americans living on reservations were counted more accurately than during the 2010 census, when almost 5% of the population was missed.
COVID-19, politics and an ever-changing deadline that cut the decennial count short weren't in those plans.
Instead of canvassing neighborhoods and setting up at huge events like the Gathering of Nations in New Mexico, advocates turned to phone banking, dropped off promotional material at entrances to tribal lands that were closed to visitors and tried to entice people to fill out the census with sacks of flour and potatoes at roadside stands.
Despite a well-financed campaign, Native Americans expect those living on about 300 reservations across the U.S. to be undercounted again. They'll find out Thursday just how good a job the Census Bureau believes it did in counting every U.S. resident during the 2020 census when the statistical agency releases two reports assessing the national count based on race, Hispanic origin, sex and age.
"At the end of the day when you have your whole religious calendar that has been discontinued, when you are looking at 'How do I support this huge health risk in my community,' it really wasn't at the forefront of everyone's minds," said Ahtza Chavez, executive director of NAVA Education Project, which led the New Mexico Native Census Coalition.
The 2020 census figures showed there are now 9.7 million people who are American Indian and Alaska Native either alone or in combination with another race — a significant increase from the 5.2 million in 2010.
The numbers don't line up with tribes' own enrollment figures, in part because the census allows people to self-identify. Tribes have stricter criteria for enrollment that can include calculating one's percentage of ancestry or tracing lineage to a list of names.
Still, evidence that people were missed can be startlingly obvious. For example, census data showed the Havasupai Tribe in northern Arizona had no one who self-responded to the census.
The tribe's chairman, Thomas Siyuja Sr., said that's impossible because he knows people who filled out the census online and by mail and encouraged others to do the same. He said some tribal members might have been reluctant to open the doors for a census taker who went door to door in Supai Village, deep in a gorge off the Grand Canyon.
"It is uncertain how our census count is zero because obviously we as a tribe do exist, and we do have tribal members and other residents who live in Supai," Siyuja said Tuesday.
Up until the 20th century, Native Americans weren't regularly counted in the once-a-decade census. They first were counted on reservations and in the general population in 1900, decades before the U.S. considered them citizens.
More recent changes allow Native Americans, Alaska Natives and other Indigenous peoples to write in their ties to specific tribes or communities.
The numbers matter because they are used to distribute $1.5 trillion in federal funding each year and to determine congressional representation. Montana gained a congressional seat after the latest census, but Arizona fell short of the numbers needed to add one.
The tribal self-response rate among Arizona tribes, not including the Navajo Nation, was less than 27%. Tribes in Montana and the Dakotas didn't fare much better. Washington state had the highest self-response rate for tribes at around 60%.
Even before Thursday's results are released, tribal leaders worried the coronavirus pandemic would contribute to an undercount. Tribes across the country shut down their reservations, making follow-up interviews with unresponsive households almost impossible for door-knocking census takers and forcing advocates to get creative.
In New Mexico, tribal advocates campaigned on social media, the radio and through videos produced in eight Indigenous languages. They passed out coloring books with census messaging, deployed Wi-Fi hot spots to help communities struggling with internet access and printed flyers to let people know head start centers, health care and housing are funded through census data, Chavez said.
"We went above and beyond, like miracle workers," she said.
The Klamath Tribes, based in Chiloquin, Oregon, did raffles and drive-thru dinner events to help people fill out the census and drew attention in a video to inaccurate figures for tribal housing in the 2010 census. Tribal Councilwoman Willa Powless said the data showed 38 homes on the tribe's land, but the tribe had more than 80.
"That really motivated people to want to participate," she said. "It was a shock for tribal members to see how severely undercounted we were."
During the last census in 2010, there was a 4.8% net undercount of Native American and Alaskan Natives living on reservations, the highest of any race. Black people were undercounted by more than 2%, Hispanics were undercounted by 1.5%, and Asians were undercounted by 0.08%. Non-Hispanic whites were overcounted by 0.8%.
Chavez thinks the undercount will be higher for Native Americans this time around. While a handful of pueblos saw high self-response rates because of previous investments in broadband, others didn't, she said.
Many tribal lands were still closed when census field operations ended in mid-October 2020. By then plans had already gotten complicated.
The Census Bureau initially planned for up to 1,000 census takers to spread out across the Navajo Nation — the largest Native American reservation in the U.S., spanning 27,000 square miles (69,000 square kilometers) in Utah, New Mexico and Arizona. It ended up with less than 300 at the peak, said James Tucker, an attorney with the Lawyer's Committee for Civil Rights who chairs a Census Bureau advisory committee.
North Dakota state Rep. Marvin Nelson, whose district includes the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa reservation, is worried about a severe undercount in his district since census operations were interrupted by the pandemic. He said his county was pegged at having 12,000 residents in the 2020 census, while federal numbers put the tribal population alone at 17,500 people.
"The way the census was conducted was really problematic," Nelson said last week. "Almost no one got a census mailing, and then due to COVID, there was no home-to-home" door-knocking by census takers.
Cowboys for Trump co-founder won't seek reelection - By Morgan Lee Associated Press
Cowboys for Trump co-founder Couy Griffin said Tuesday that he won't run for reelection for southern New Mexico's Otero County commission or seek other public office in the 2022 election cycle.
As a crucial registration deadline passed, Griffin said he has lost faith in the political system as an avenue for change as his four-year term draws to an end — though he plans to continue with public speaking engagements and will advocate for local and statewide Republican candidates.
"It's just my faith in the political system is pretty much nonexistent right now," said Griffin, a Republican. "I've done all I can over the course of the last three years ... And I've just been attacked every time I turn around."
He added: "It's not my desire, I should say, to remain in politics. But who knows what the future holds."
The first-term county commissioner said his decision to sit out the election was not tied to misdemeanor criminal charges he faces in federal court stemming from the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, with a trial scheduled in late March.
Griffin appeared on an outdoor terrace of the Capitol and tried to lead the crowd in prayer. He denies allegations that he knowingly entered barricaded areas of the Capitol grounds with the intent of disrupting government as Congress certified the 2020 Electoral College results.
Griffin is also at the center of a yearslong legal battle with New Mexico election regulators about Cowboys for Trump and whether it must register as a political organization.
In January, he voted with his county commission to hire a private contractor to review the 2020 presidential election in Otero County.
New Mexico's top election regulator and prosecutor last week warned residents of Otero County to be wary of intrusive questions and potential intimidation by door-to-door canvassers linked to the election review.
Griffin on Tuesday endorsed local Republican Party leader Amy Barela in her campaign for the Republican nomination to fill his seat on the three-member Otero County commission, and said he would support anti-abortion activist Ethel Maharg in her Republican bid for governor.
Maharg's request to run on the Republican primary ballot still was pending approval of election regulators on Tuesday.
Mexican wildlife managers release 2 pairs of wolves - By Susan Montoya Bryan Associated Press
Wildlife managers in the United States say their counterparts in Mexico have released two pairs of endangered Mexican gray wolves south of the U.S. border as part of an ongoing reintroduction effort.
The wolves came from the Ladder Ranch in southern New Mexico and were placed in two areas in the state of Chihuahua, officials with the Arizona Game and Fish Department announced Tuesday.
The wolf population in Mexico now numbers around 45, with 14 litters being born since 2014, officials said.
"Through international cooperation, recovery efforts are moving forward in Mexico and contradict the contention of some critics that recovery can't occur in that country," Jim deVos, Mexican wolf coordinator for the Arizona Game and Fish Department, said in a statement.
The U.S. reintroduction program has been operating in New Mexico and Arizona for more than two decades. The most recent count in early 2021 showed at least 186 wolves in the wild in the two states, marking a 14% increase over the previous year and a doubling of the population over the last five years.
The results of a new survey of the U.S. population are due soon.
Agencies in the U.S. and Mexico's National Commission of Natural Protected Areas have been working for years to help the species recover.
The Mexican gray wolf is the rarest subspecies of gray wolf in North America and was listed as endangered in the U.S. in 1976.
The wolf was once common throughout portions of the southwestern U.S. and throughout Mexico's Sierra Madre Occidental and Oriental regions, but had been all but eliminated from the wild by the 1970s due to extensive predator control initiatives.
Officials said the Mexican commission along with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and state wildlife managers are in final negotiations for a letter of intent aimed at strengthening the program. It will include efforts focused on conflicts with livestock where the predators are reintroduced.
Ranchers in Arizona and New Mexico have been critical of reintroduction efforts because the wolves have been known to kill livestock, but environmentalists have been pushing for the release of more captive wolves into the wild.
Indian Health Service head nominated amid tough challenges - By Felicia Fonseca Associated Press
President Joe Biden announced Wednesday he is nominating veteran health administrator Roselyn Tso to oversee the federal agency that delivers health care to more than 2.5 million Native Americans and Alaska Natives.
The selection of Tso to lead the Indian Health Services comes amid a push from tribal health advocates for stability in the agency. Acting directors have filled the role for years at the agency that's chronically underfunded and struggles to meet the needs of Indian Country.
Tso, an enrolled member of the Navajo Nation, most recently served as director of the agency's Navajo region, which stretches across parts of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah. She began her career with the Indian Health Service in 1984 and held various roles in the agency's Portland, Oregon, area and at its headquarters in Maryland, the White House said.
Navajo Nation President Jonathan Nez said Tso is "exceptionally qualified" to lead the agency and pointed specifically to her work during the coronavirus pandemic, when the Navajo Nation had one of the highest per capita infection rates in the U.S.
"Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, her leadership, expertise and compassion have helped to reduce the spread of this modern-day monster and save lives," Nez said in a statement.
Tso's nomination is subject to confirmation from the U.S. Senate. She holds a bachelor's degree in interdisciplinary studies from Marylhurst University in Oregon and a master's degree in organizational management from the University of Phoenix.
The Indian Health Service repeatedly has been the focus of congressional hearings and scathing government reports that seek reform. The agency runs two dozen hospitals and about 90 other health care facilities around the country, most of which are small and on or near Native American reservations.
Other hospitals and health care facilities are run by tribes or tribal organizations under contract with the agency.
The National Indian Health Board wrote to Biden last November, saying it was disappointed he had not made the nomination of an Indian Health Service director a higher priority, particularly because the coronavirus pandemic has disproportionately sickened and killed Native Americans.
Tribal members also have been hit hard as COVID-19 fueled America's drug crisis, and have some of the worst health disparities among other groups in the U.S.
The health board didn't specifically weigh in on Tso's nomination but recently outlined expectations for a new director. Among them are advocating for full and mandatory funding of the Indian Health Service, consulting with tribes in a meaningful way, investing long-term in public health infrastructure and keeping tribes up to date on agency actions and funding decisions.
Man extradited from Mexico to face trial in Roswell killing - Associated Press
A man sought in the 2020 strangulation killing of a New Mexico woman has been extradited to the United States after being arrested in Mexico, officials said Wednesday.
Jorge Rico-Ruvira, 34, will stand trial in state District Court in Roswell in the killing of Isela Sanchez, the 27-year-old mother of his young son, state and district prosecutors said in a statement.
An Amber Alert was issued for the son, Osiel Ernesto Rico, when the father fled to Mexico, but officials announced last year that the boy had been found safe.
No details were released then on the boy's status but court records now indicate a District Court judge in January appointed temporary kinship guardians for the child.
Rico-Ruvira is also charged with child abuse.
State Attorney General Hector Balderas and 5th Judicial District Attorney Dianna Luce said in the statement announcing Rico-Ruvira's extradition that he left Isela Sanchez's daughter, who was 7 at the time, alone in the house with when he left with the couple's son.
Court records show Rico-Ruvira is represented by the state public defender's office.
"Justice requires that we not rush to judgment. It's important to remember that Mr. Rico-Ruvira is presumed innocent," Judi Caruso, one of the attorneys on his legal team, said in a statement Wednesday.
Police: Man killed after chase tied to slaying of spa worker – Albuquerque Journal, Associated Press
Albuquerque police say a man who police shot and killed after a Feb. 25 police chase has been identified as the person who killed a spa worker 10 days earlier.
According to Albuquerque Police Chief Harold Medina, evidence from fingerprints, surveillance video and a reported admission by Raphael Marquez to another person tied Marquez to the killing at the Canna Spa Massage.
The victim's identity hasn't been released.
The Albuquerque Journal reports Marquez was killed by a State Police officer and two Bernalillo County Sheriff’s deputies. The shooting happened near Belen following a pursuit on Interstate 25 as investigators sought him in connection with a crime spree.
A police statement said Marquez also was a person of interest in a Dec. 24 homicide and that evidence connects him to that killing.
A timeline released by police said Marquez also was sought in several other incidents, including a break-in at a business and home burglaries.
US looks to boost cooperation with tribes on land management - By Susan Montoya Bryan Associated Press
National Park Service Director Chuck Sams said Tuesday he and other officials are committed to boosting the role Native American tribes can play in managing public lands around the U.S.
He told members of a congressional committee during a virtual hearing that part of the effort includes integrating Indigenous knowledge into management plans and recognizing that federal lands once belonged to the tribes.
Sams was questioned about how the National Park Service could use existing authority andrecent executive directives issued by top federal officials to make good on the latest round of promises to tribes regarding meaningful consultation and having a seat at the table.
Sams, who is Cayuse and Walla Walla and a citizen of the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, is the first Native American to lead the Park Service. He said education will be a key part of seeing changes on the ground.
"Much of this has been missing from our history books, that understanding that tribes are sovereign," he said, adding that the federal government has an obligation to ensure that tribal voices are heard.
There currently are four national parks where tribes share co-management responsibilities: Canyon de Chelly National Monument within the boundaries of the Navajo Nation in Arizona, Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve in southeast Alaska, Grand Portage National Monument within the Grand Portage Indian Reservation in Minnesota, and Big Cypress National Preserve in Florida.
Tribal officials from New Mexico, Colorado and the Pacific Northwest also testified about the importance of including Native American voices when weighing decisions that could impact cultural sites, water supplies or even forest health.
Sams said his agency has about 80 cooperative agreements in place with tribes now and he expects that number to grow.
At Acadia National Park, the Wabanaki Nations of Maine have been involved in a multiyear project focused on traditional gathering of sweetgrass that have resulted from centuries of learned ecological knowledge.
The Nisqually Tribe is working with officials at Mount Rainier National Park to publish a report on plant gathering there. Consultation with the tribe also has resulted in a guide for developing interpretive programs.
Carleton Bowekaty, the lieutenant governor of Zuni Pueblo and a member of the Bears Ears Inter-Tribal Coalition, told lawmakers that tribes in the Southwestern U.S. banded together to protect their mutual interests as part of the fight over the Bears Ears National Monument in Utah.
While some tribal communities are located hundreds of miles away from the monument, Bowekaty said the area still plays an integral role in traditional practices and ceremonies and that tribes are being asked for their traditional knowledge as the Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. Forest Service work on a management plan for the monument.
"What could be a better avenue of restorative justice than giving tribes the opportunity to participate in the management of lands that their ancestors were removed from?" he asked, adding that collaborative problem-solving and a candid exchange of perspectives will be crucial for co-management to work.
Doug Kiel, a citizen of the Oneida Nation and an assistant professor of history at Northwestern University, told the congressional panel about a philosophy of long-term planning that is central to many Native American tribes. He said it centers on what will be in the best interest of people seven generations from now.
Land managers today can learn from thousands of years of history, he said, as the pressures of climate change and global instability mount.
"One important way to think about what it means to incorporate Indigenous thought into these dialogues is to think about depth of time, a different perspective," he said. "That's a lot of what we're talking about with traditional ecological knowledge."
Whitmer urges Congress to pause 18-cents-a-gallon gas tax - By David Eggert Associated Press
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer joined five other Democratic governors Tuesday in urging Congress to pause the 18.4-cents-a-gallon federal gasoline tax for the rest of the year to alleviate pump prices that exceed $4 per gallon.
Pending Democratic-sponsored legislation would require the transfer of general funds to offset lost transportation revenue.
"At a time when people are directly impacted by rising prices on everyday goods, a federal gas tax holiday is a tool in the toolbox to reduce costs for Americans, and we urge you to give every consideration to this proposed legislation," the governors of Michigan, Pennsylvania, Colorado, Wisconsin, Minnesota and New Mexico wrote to congressional leaders.
Whitmer, who is up for reelection, does not support temporarily freezing the state's 27.2-cents-per-gallon gas tax, which funds construction work, or the 6% sales tax on fuel, which mostly goes to schools and local governments under the state constitution.
After taking office, she unsuccessfully proposed substantially increasing the per-gallon tax by 45 cents to fix roads and bridges. Spokesperson Bobby Leddy said suspending the federal tax is "the best way to bring down the price of gas" without impacting the state's ability to repair roads.
Pump prices were rising before Russia invaded Ukraine and have spiraled faster since the start of the war.
Republicans responded to the letter by noting that Whitmer ordered the closure of a pipeline in the Straits of Mackinac that transports crude oil and natural gas liquids.
"Gretchen Whitmer's posturing about a federal gas tax holiday is a slap in the face to Michiganders who live under the constant threat of rising energy prices as a result of her campaign to shut down Line 5," Republican National Committee spokesperson Preya Samsundar said.
The governor is worried about the potential for a spill in the channel linking Lake Michigan and Lake Huron. The pipeline remains open amid a legal battle.
Whitmer is expected to soon veto Republican-sponsored legislation that would cut the state income tax, make more seniors eligible for exemptions and largely restore a child tax credit. She favors more targeted relief for retirees and lower-income workers that would not reduce revenue as much.
The conservative Michigan Freedom Fund said the governor "is hoping to distract taxpayers with a hollow call for Congress to do something while Whitmer herself could sign a tax cut bill that's on her desk right now."
New Mexico governor slashes taxes as she pursues reelection - By Morgan Lee Associated Press
Democratic Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham signing a package of tax rebates, credits and rate reductions worth about $530 million in the initiative's first year and urged congressional leaders to suspend taxes on gasoline in response to surging fuel prices.
Lujan Grisham signed the tax legislation hours after President Joe Biden announced his decision to cut off Russian oil exports in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
New Mexico, the nation's No. 2 producer of crude oil behind Texas, is experiencing a windfall in state government income tied to oil and natural gas production through a variety of taxes, royalties and lease sales as energy prices surge.
"We should be looking at relief in any place that we can," said Lujan Grisham, who signed a letter with five other governors that urges Congress to suspend federal gasoline tax collection through the end of the year.
Under the state legislation signed Tuesday, New Mexico will deliver one-time tax rebates of $250 for individuals who file taxes in New Mexico for 2021, or $500 for joint filers. The reforms also narrow the state's tax on Social Security to high-income retirees while offering a per-child tax credit of up to $175 and slightly reducing taxes on retail sales and business transactions, among other provisions
Lujan Grisham said state tax changes will help local households offset rising retail gasoline prices, and that she has convened Cabinet advisers to study ways to provide additional relief.
"I don't know what that looks like" yet, the governor said. "You can't get to work if you can't pay for gas, you can't take grandparents and children to the doctor or school."
New Mexico is among a dozen states that tax Social Security benefits. The new tax changes restrict state taxes on Social Security income to retirees who make more than $100,000 a year, or joint tax filers who report more than $150,000 in annual income.
State gross receipts tax on retail sales and business services will decline in two stages to about 4.9%. Combined state and optional local gross receipts taxes can reach a combined rate of nearly 9%.
The tax relief bill also gives $1,000 credits to full-time hospital nurses for the 2022 tax year, and provides a new tax exemption on military pension benefits, a credit toward households that install solar equipment to generate electricity and waives sales taxes on the purchase of feminine hygiene products such as tampons.
The one-time tax rebates are expected to cost the state about $312 million. With the tax reforms fully phased in, the state will forgo about $400 million in annual revenue that it would have collected otherwise without the reforms.
Across the nation, state lawmakers in blue and red states are proposing to cut taxes and fees as budget surpluses swell, though warnings have emerged that U.S. inflation and Russia's invasion of Ukraine will change the outlook for public finances.
New Mexico's tax relief bill moved through the Legislature with bipartisan support in the final hours of an annual legislative that adjourned on Feb. 17, though some Republicans favored even larger tax cuts.
The Legislature approved a $1 billion spending increase under a $8.5 billion general fund budget proposal for the year starting on July 1. Lujan Grisham has until Wednesday to sign the plan with veto authority over any provisions.
Prosecutors seek to hold New Mexico woman in fatal pursuit - Associated Press
Prosecutors are seeking to keep in custody a New Mexico woman accused of causing a crash last week that killed a police officer and a retired firefighter after she allegedly lied about having been kidnapped.
Jeannine Jaramillo, 46, had been scheduled to make an initial court appearance Tuesday. Instead, she now is due to appear in court next week for a hearing that will determine whether she will remain locked up pending trial.
Jaramillo on Monday appeared before a Santa Fe magistrate judge on a separate drug charge. A criminal complaint stated she was concealing methamphetamine in a body cavity when she was booked over the weekend on charges related to the deadly pursuit.
Jaramillo faces two counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of Santa Fe police Officer Robert Duran, 43, and Frank Lovato, 62. Lovato was a retired firefighter from the northern New Mexico city of Las Vegas who was driving a pickup truck and not involved with last Wednesday's pursuit.
Jaramillo also faces charges of receiving or transferring a stolen motor vehicle, aggravated fleeing and tampering with evidence in the First Judicial District in Santa Fe.
"There is, without question, sufficient cause to assert that Jaramillo was driving the stolen vehicle willfully and freely from any kind of duress," District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies told reporters Saturday. "I am confident in saying that Jaramillo acted on her own accord and in a manner that is consistent with her recent criminal behavior of deceit and disregard for public safety."
Jaramillo's public defender, Richard Pugh, did not immediately respond Tuesday to a telephone message seeking comment.
Court records show Jaramillo has a lengthy criminal record that includes two instances last fall in which she was pursued by Cibola County authorities while allegedly driving stolen vehicles. She told officers then, too, that she was held at knifepoint, but authorities never found the alleged attacker, according to court documents.
Prosecutors asked the court to dismiss the charges from the first incident in September, pending further investigation. Records show Jaramillo was arrested again in October by a Cibola County sheriff's detective investigating the theft of a work truck. That case was dismissed in November to allow for more investigation.
Jaramillo also has been arrested over the years on charges of receiving or transferring stolen motor vehicles, auto burglary, shoplifting and attempted aggravated battery upon a peace officer.
In the crash last Wednesday that killed the officer and the retired firefighter, authorities reported the car that Jaramillo crawled out of after crashing into another vehicle had been reported stolen in northern New Mexico days earlier.
DNA found on the airbag belonged to Jaramillo and evidence from the vehicle's computer showed there was only one person inside at the time of the crash, according to court documents.
During an interview with police, Jaramillo told investigators that her boyfriend hit her, poured gasoline on her and tried to kidnap her at knifepoint, officials said.
Authorities said there were inconsistencies in her story, including that she had no physical marks, her clothing did not smell of gasoline and she could not provide information to identify the boyfriend, according to court documents.
A police officer reported that he saw only a woman get out of the car. The officer also said the keys to the stolen car were found in the back seat of the police patrol unit where Jaramillo was seated after the crash.
Officials: 1 dead in 2 tent fires in downtown Albuquerque - Associated Press
Authorities say one person is dead following two fires involving tents in Albuquerque's downtown area early Tuesday morning.
A fire department statement said the cause of the male victim's death wasn't immediately known and that police and fire officials were investigating the fires.
The statement said they occurred about a half-mile apart.
The victim's identity wasn't released and no additional information was immediately available.
Changing snowfall makes it harder to fight fire with fire - By Brittany Peterson And Matthew Brown Associated Press
Dripping flaming fuel as they go, a line of workers slowly descends a steep, snow-covered hillside above central Colorado's South Platte River, torching piles of woody debris that erupt into flames shooting two stories high.
It's winter in the Rocky Mountains, and fresh snow cover allowed the crew of 11 to safely confine the controlled burn.
Such operations are a central piece of the Biden administration's $50 billion plan to reduce the density of western forests that have been exploding into firestorms as climate change bakes the region.
But the same warming trends that worsen wildfires will also challenge the administration's attempts to guard against them.
Increasingly erratic weather means snow is not always there when needed to safely burn off tall debris piles like those on Colorado's Pike-San Isabel National Forest. And that seriously complicates the job of exhausted firefighters, now forced into service year-round.
Their goal is to cut and burn enough vegetation that the next fires won't be as catastrophic as ones that leveled vast forestland and neighborhoods in Colorado, California, Oregon, Montana and elsewhere.
Western wildfires have become more volatile as climate change dries forests already thick with vegetation from years of intensive fire suppression. And the window for controlled burns is shrinking.
"It's been a little bit harder just because of shorter winters," said David Needham, a U.S. Forest Service ranger who led the Colorado burn operation in late February when the thermometer hovered around zero degrees Fahrenheit. Surrounding hillsides showed barren scars from past wildfires, including a 2002 blaze that destroyed 133 homes and at the time was the largest in state history.
"On days like this, we capitalize on temperature being in the negatives," Needham said, "Even small snow storms coming in definitely helps us with that."
Across the Rockies, piles of slash and trees cleared to reduce fire hazards span some 100,000 acres, waiting to be burned once the right amount of snow is on the ground. Sometimes there's too much, making the piles inaccessible. Other times there's not enough snow and prescribed burns get canceled so they don't get out of hand like a previous one that led to fatalities.
An overnight snow in central Colorado meant the crew from the forest service and Mile High Youth Corps could burn debris from twice the area they planned. Yet officials said climate change is making it more difficult to find that sweet spot for safe burning.
Spring is arriving earlier and snow-covered ground is disappearing two weeks sooner, according to Rutgers University researcher and New Jersey state Climatologist David Robinson, who has examined more than 50 years of snow cover data collected through satellite imagery.
"One thing we know about climate change is it is increasing the variability and the extremes we are experiencing," said Robinson. "Out West, once the season shifts, you get very dry, very quickly and it stays dry for months. So you have a real tight window there."
2020 was the worst wildfire season on record in Colorado, where summers and falls also have been warmer and drier, said Assistant State Climatologist Becky Bolinger. It's "a completely different ball game in terms of wildfires," she said.
For parts of the Rockies, this winter brought too much snow, forcing officials to delay burns. Meanwhile, parts of Wyoming haven't received enough snow to moisten the ground and allow fuel piles to be torched. Even when there is snow, that doesn't mean it will last until the debris stops smoldering, said Brian Keating with the Forest Service's Rocky Mountain region.
When pile burns turn into wildfires, Keating said it's usually because snow around when the burn started disappears. The next wind storm can kick up embers and ignite landscape that days earlier seemed fireproof.
Putting off pile burning carries consequences, too. Until the piles are gone, forest managers won't begin another kind of controlled fire called broadcast burning, which consumes vegetation within stands previously thinned with chainsaws and other equipment.
"If we don't burn the piles, ... that can get kicked down the road another year or two," said Keating. "And every year, we keep building this backlog of piles because we can't get to them all."
Another problem is smoke: Burns can be delayed if the smoke will exacerbate poor air quality.
Despite such hurdles, burns are crucial to the Biden administration's 10-year plan to reduce wildfire hazards across almost 80,000 square miles (200,000 square kilometers) of public, private and tribal lands. The recently passed infrastructure bill includes $500 million for controlled burns over five years.
Prescribed burns and logging were used to reduce wildfire hazards last year on about 4,050 square miles of forest — the most in a decade. By ramping that up, officials hope to get ahead of the problem and use less logging in future years, said Frankie Romero, who oversees the forest service's prescribed burn program.
"Once we get into a maintenance cycle and we can continue to treat that same area while it's in its preferred condition with a lot less fuel, then it becomes a lot easier," Romero said. "We're going to experience wildfires in the future ... and they're going to cause problems. The difficult part is trying to remember what those problems would have looked like had we not intervened earlier."
Environmental advocates warn that the scale of work being proposed could allow excessive logging that will harm forests and do little to prevent catastrophic fires.
But Oregon State University forestry professor John Bailey said the choice is between unchecked wildfires raging across the landscape and aggressive steps to at least partially counteract the forces of climate change.
"Not to embrace this challenge is choosing a future with a lot of wildfire in it and almost no control over where they start and where they spread and how much smoke is in the air and for how long," Bailey said.