DA launches new system to notify law enforcement of missed court dates - By Elise Kaplan, City Desk ABQ
This story was originally published by City Desk ABQ.
The Second Judicial District Attorney’s Office has launched a new system to notify law enforcement agencies when an officer misses a hearing or a pre-trial interview.
Joshua Boone, the chief deputy district attorney, said in an interview on Tuesday that the DA’s Office started working on the system—essentially a Google spreadsheet that is populated when an attorney or paralegal in the office fills out a form—in the fall and began using it earlier this year.
“The minute we submit this form, it automatically sends an email to the court liaison,” Boone said. “Then APD created their own separate email and it will automatically send it to that designated email.”
The processes around notification of missed court hearings and interviews has been a hot topic as the FBI investigates allegations that DWI officers in the Albuquerque Police Department were colluding with a local defense attorney to get cases dismissed. (However the exact allegations are unclear and there has also been a complaint that one of the officers told a person he arrested that if he hired a certain lawyer he could “ensure that no court case would be filed in court by APD.”)
The District Attorney’s Office has now dismissed 195 cases since being notified that “multiple members of APD’s DWI unit have major integrity issues,” said spokesperson Nancy Laflin. She said prosecutors had to dismiss all of the cases where the officers being investigated by the FBI were necessary witnesses but there are some cases they can still proceed on without having to call them to testify.
When asked about whether the new system could help catch patterns of officers missing court hearings in the future, Boone said “it certainly isn’t going to hurt.”
“(Law enforcement agencies) can use it for whatever reason they want,” he said. “We use it because you don’t want to lose cases. We believe in this work, we’re trying to make sure our witnesses show up. We want to make the community safer.”
At a news conference last week, Chief Harold Medina said APD had been getting notifications from the DA’s Office when an officer missed a hearing but those stopped in September 2022. It started getting the notifications through the DA’s new system earlier this year.
Boone said he could not speak for the prior administration—Raúl Torrez was in office until the end of 2022 when he became the state’s Attorney General—but after Sam Bregman was appointed to the role of District Attorney, prosecutors would communicate with officers and other witnesses ahead of a hearing or interview to try to ensure that they show up. He said it would be “case by case” whether prosecutors would notify a supervisor if an officer didn’t show.
“We will follow up at times with the officers and be like, ‘hey, is there something that we should know about?’” Boone said. “There’s no rule, there’s no law that says once an officer misses court you must call them and find out or call their commander or supervisor. So it was left to individual DAs, sometimes that would get escalated, sometimes it wouldn’t.”
Lauren Rodriguez, a spokesperson for Torrez, did not answer questions about why notifications stopped being sent to APD in the fall of 2022.
“Every law enforcement agency is responsible for ensuring that their officers appear for scheduled hearings,” she wrote in a statement. “As a courtesy, our office provided regular updates to all of our law enforcement partners whenever their officers failed to appear, but ultimately each agency was responsible for their officers’ attendance in court.”
APD spokesperson Gilbert Gallegos said it is helpful for APD to hold officers accountable if they are notified by the DA’s Office or the courts of missed hearings and that it is “not a blame game.”
“The whole issue of whether the DA or the Courts are obligated to share information seems beside the point,” Gallegos said. “However we get the information, it helps us hold officers accountable.”
He said Medina has worked with the DA’s Office under both Torrez and Bregman to improve the process for officers to turn in evidence. And, he said, Mayor Tim Keller created the Metro Crime Initiative, which strives to improve the criminal justice system and “also included a call for dashboard where we can share data to improve public safety.”
“We have worked for the past year to get access to a court data system that now gives us more access, but it still does not include data for specific officers,” said Gallegos. “We are trying to get the courts to add that data. Once that occurs, our data system can automate the data so we can effectively track officers who miss hearings or trials.”
Los Lunas will hold meeting to discuss possible new agreement with bottled water company – Valencia County News-Bulletin, KUNM News
The Los Lunas Village Council will meet Thursday to vote on an agreement with Niagara Bottling.
The Valencia County News-Bulletin reports the company is requesting an expansion of its allotted water usage from a well that belongs to the village. Many locals say that they can’t afford to give up more water in the face of drought and groundwater overuse.
The Second Lieutenant Governor of Isleta Pueblo spoke out against the deal at a previous meeting on behalf of the Pueblo. He said that because the wells are close to Isleta’s southern boundary, it would have the same effect as if the water were drawn from Pueblo lands. The mayors of Peralta and Bosque Farms also oppose the agreement.
The Los Lunas Council discussed the agreement at its December 7th meeting, but the item was tabled until this week to give a hydrologist time to provide additional information about the health of the aquifer.
The company already consistently exceeds its water usage under its current contract.
The meeting will be held Thursday at 6 p.m. at Village Hall.
NM Senate narrowly rejects ban on immigrant detention, supporters warn abuses will carry on - Austin Fisher, Source New Mexico
The upper chamber of New Mexico’s Legislature on Tuesday voted to once again reject a proposal that would have barred local governments from hiring federal immigration police to detain people for civil violations of federal immigration law.
In an 18-21 vote on Tuesday afternoon, the New Mexico Senate voted not to pass Senate Bill 145, which would have prohibited local governments from entering or renewing contracts with Immigration and Customs Enforcement to detain people seeking asylum in the United States.
“We should not be complicit in this detention, and in treating people inhumanely,” said Sen. Antoinette Sedillo-Lopez (D-Albuquerque), one of the bill’s five sponsors. “This bill seeks dignity and not detention.”
Six Democrats joined Republicans on Tuesday to vote down the measure: Sens. Pete Campos (D-Las Vegas), Joseph Cervantes (D-Las Cruces), Robert Gonzales (D-Rancho De Taos), Martin Hickey (D-Albuquerque), George Muñoz (D-Gallup) and Benny Shendo (D-Jemez Pueblo).
Since the bill failed to pass the Senate, it cannot be considered in the House of Representatives.
Advocates are disappointed that so much of the debate on the bill on Tuesday wasn’t based in fact or reality, said Sofia Genovese, the managing attorney at the New Mexico Immigrant Law Center and an expert on the bill.
Genovese pointed to Cervantes’ inaccurate claim that advocates are the only ones who are calling attention to the conditions in the prisons. During his time debating on the Senate floor, Cervantes said ICE, Border Patrol and Homeland Security officials should have been available to testify on the bill.
“We ought to really have answers, because we’re only guessing,” Cervantes told the Senate. “We’re entirely guessing by the information from the advocacy group, which is that if we close down the New Mexico facilities, fewer people will be detained. We really don’t have any data, information or statistics, to my mind, to support that.”
Several government oversight agencies have repeatedly found that each of the three federal detention facilities in New Mexico are failing to meet basic standards, Genovese said. The Department of Homeland Security Office of the Inspector General has twice called for the closure of the prison in Torrance County.
“These aren’t things that advocates are making up, these are things that the government’s own watchdogs have sounded the alarm about, so it’s frustrating to see these complaints minimized when they are well substantiated,” Genovese said.
Genovese said advocates are also disappointed in two Democrats who were absent for the vote: Sens. Siah Correa Hemphill, (D-Silver City) and Sen. Elizabeth Stefanics (D-Cerrillos).
When the Senate clerk went through the roll call vote, Hemphill and Stefanics along with Sen. Katy Duhigg (D-Albuquerque) could not be seen on the Senate floor. Their votes were marked as “absent” on the official tally.
Duhigg was formally excused from voting because her law firm represents Management and Training Company, which runs the Otero County Prison Facility.
Stefanics said she was “called away dealing with a capital issue with the Gov’s staff and other matters.” Hemphill did not respond to an email seeking comment.
“We didn’t see Democrats live up to New Mexican values today,” Genovese said. “It’s really disappointing because people will continue to suffer in these facilities, and they’ll certainly continue to hear about it from us, each and every single time someone suffers harm, each and every single time someone dies, they’re going to hear about it.”
This story has been updated to reflect the vote was 18 to 21.
Construction underway for world-class film training center at Rail Yards - City Desk ABQ
This story was originally published by City Desk ABQ.
Construction has started to transform a part of the historic Albuquerque Rail Yards into a world-class film production training center.
The project is a partnership between the City of Albuquerque, Central New Mexico Community College (CNM), and the New Mexico Economic Development Department. The iconic Boiler Shop building at the Rail Yards, once used to transfer heavy parts to train engines, is being transformed into a state-of-the-art training hub for future filmmakers, creating a workforce development pipeline for the state’s booming film industry and a contributing to economic revitalization for Downtown Albuquerque. CNM’s longstanding Film Production and Digital Media programs, as well as the State’s film training program (Media Arts Collective), will co-locate and share equipment and training resources at the facility.
“This state-of-the-art facility is going to increase access for New Mexicans to get high-quality film production training and begin careers that will help our film industry continue to thrive. We’re honored to continue this journey with our great partners at the State of New Mexico and the City of Albuquerque to deliver a world-class facility for New Mexicans and the film industry,” aid CNM President Tracy Hartzler.
Once completed, the facility will offer industry-standard, hands-on, and craft-specific workforce training and job competencies for the film, television, and digital media industry. Along with soundstages, there will be classrooms, offices, post-production and flex spaces, featuring the most current equipment and technology.
“We look forward to making this a hub for training the next generation of film production professionals who will help New Mexico remain as one of the country’s top filmmaking destinations,” said Chad Burris, Executive Director of the New Mexico Media Arts Collective.
Voters approved bond funding for CNM to improve and expand their film production training facilities. Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, with support from the New Mexico Legislature and the City of Albuquerque, has also allocated funds to build facilities and training programs that will deliver set-ready, skilled New Mexicans to fill jobs in the state’s thriving film and television industry.
Students from across the state will be able to participate in the training opportunities, including students from Santa Fe Community College, Doña Ana Community College, Luna Community College, San Juan College, New Mexico State University, Institute of American Indian Arts, Eastern New Mexico University and Highlands University.
The facility is expected to be completed in late 2025, and open for classes and training in January 2026.
Navajo, Zuni tribes to implement restoration plan for Fort Wingate, focusing on forest and fish - Associated Press
Two Native American tribes, the state of New Mexico and the U.S. Army have finalized a restoration plan for a former military installation near Gallup.
Explosives and munitions were stored and disposed of at Fort Wingate until it closed in 1993.
The Navajo Nation, Zuni Pueblo and the New Mexico Office of Natural Resources Trustee reached an agreement with the federal government in March 2022 to settle claims that land, water and cultural resources were negatively impacted by hazardous substances at the site.
The site now is undergoing environmental cleanup before the tract of land can be transferred to the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs to benefit the two tribes. Both tribes have long-standing historical ties to the lands in and around Fort Wingate, which sits on about 24 square miles (62 square kilometers). The land is almost entirely surrounded by federally owned or administered lands, including national forest and tribal lands.
More than $1.1 million from the settlement is to be used on restoration projects, according to the plan released earlier this month. Those include restoring parts of the Cibola National Forest and conserving habitat for the Zuni bluehead sucker, a fish species listed as endangered in New Mexico and that is culturally significant to Zuni Pueblo.
Senate narrowly votes to keep drive-thru cannabis sales - Austin Fisher, Source New Mexico
By one vote, the New Mexico Senate passed an amendment on Monday afternoon that will continue to allow cannabis businesses to offer their services at drive-thru windows.
Sen. Katy Duhigg (D-Albuquerque) is carrying Senate Bill 6, which would make a number of changes to New Mexico’s cannabis law. A substitute bill written by the Senate Judiciary Committee would have prohibited sales of cannabis through a drive-thru window.
Sen. Jeff Steinborn (D-Las Cruces) introduced three amendments to the bill on the Senate floor on Monday. The first took out the drive-thru cannabis prohibition and allowed them to stay in place.
Opponents in the Senate argued that drive-thru cannabis sales will eventually lead to loss of life.
The Senate passed the amendment in a 21-20 vote, with Sen. Ronn Griggs (R-Alamogordo) not voting. Hours later, senators passed the overall bill in a 25-15 party-line vote.
The New Mexico Department of Health noted in its analysis that the bill already prohibits cannabis and alcohol from being sold and used in the same place.
Steinborn cited phone calls he had with the head of the state’s Cannabis Control Division and his local police chief who told him they haven’t had any problems with drive-thru cannabis.
Sen. Joseph Cervantes (D-Las Cruces) cited state Department of Transportation data showing that in 2021, the latest annual data available, there were more drug-related traffic accident fatalities than in the previous five years.
Supporters argued that drive-thru allows disabled people with limited mobility to access the drug, there are already drive-thru pharmacies for other drugs, and that the decision should be left to local governments.
New Mexico Republicans vie to challenge incumbent senator and reclaim House swing district - By Morgan Lee, Associated Press
Republican contenders filed petitions Tuesday to appear on New Mexico's June 4 primary ballot in hopes of challenging incumbent Democratic U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich and reclaiming a congressional swing seat along the U.S. border with Mexico.
Businesswoman Nella Domenici, daughter of longtime U.S. Sen. Pete V. Domenici, filed a candidate signature petition with the New Mexico secretary of state's office as she seeks the GOP nomination to take on Heinrich as he runs for a third term.
Domenici has highlighted her concerns about inflation, crime, border enforcement and childhood well-being in early campaign announcements but declined to comment further Tuesday.
She'll likely face competition from Bernalillo County Sheriff Manny Gonzales, who recently left the Democratic Party to seek the GOP Senate nomination. He also filed candidacy paperwork Tuesday.
Gonzales served two terms as sheriff starting in 2014 in the state's most populous county, coordinated policing initiatives with Donald Trump in 2020 as the then-president deployed federal agents to Albuquerque. Gonzales ran unsuccessfully for Albuquerque mayor in 2021 against incumbent Tim Keller.
Nationwide, Democrats are defending 23 Senate seats this year as they hope to hold on to a majority that currently stands at 51-49.
Heinrich won reelection in 2018 with about 54% of the vote in a three-way race against Republican Mick Rich and Libertarian candidate and former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson.
Republicans also are choosing a contender to take on U.S. Rep. Gabe Vasquez in a congressional swing seat along the U.S. border with Mexico.
Former one-term U.S. Rep. Yvette Herrell hopes to reclaim the 2nd District seat she lost in the 2022 election. A campaign manager submitted Herrell's election registration paperwork Tuesday.
The district is one of about a dozen in the national spotlight as Republicans campaign to keep their slim U.S. House majority in 2024.
The Republican Party unsuccessfully challenged a Democratic-drawn congressional map that reshaped the 2nd District as it divvied up a conservative, oil-producing region among three congressional districts. In November, the state Supreme Court upheld a lower court decision that the map fell short of "egregious gerrymandering."
Democrats currently control New Mexico's two Senate seats and all three congressional districts, along with all other statewide elected offices and broad majorities in the state House and Senate.
Former state legislator Sharon Clahchischilliage, of Gadii'ahi, a Navajo community on the outskirts of Farmington in northwestern New Mexico, filed a petition to seek the Republican nomination to the 3rd Congressional District — where Democratic Congresswoman Teresa Leger Fernandez, of Santa Fe, is seeking a third term.
The sprawling district extends across northern and eastern New Mexico, including national security facilities at Los Alamos National Laboratory and rural communities recovering from the largest wildfire in the state's recorded history.
Clahchischilliage said she wants to address government regulatory overreach and improve economic opportunity.
"Look at gun control, look at oil and gas ... there's a lot of over-regulating," she said. "Farmers are feeling it, ranchers are feeling it. We're all feeling it as New Mexicans and it's not common sense to us."
Two Republican contenders are seeking the nomination in the 1st Congressional District to challenge Democratic U.S. Rep. Melanie Stansbury, of Albuquerque. They include shooting range owner and health care entrepreneur Louie Sanchez, of Albuquerque, who has highlighted concerns about public safety, gun rights, border security and the economy.
Steve Jones, of Ruidoso, said he'll use his experience as a certified public accountant to help rein in federal spending and the national deficit.
Senate confirms new Indian Affairs secretary – Santa Fe New Mexican, KUNM News
A Senate committee unanimously confirmed a new secretary for Indian Affairs Monday and for the first time in state history she is not from a New Mexico tribe.
The Santa Fe New Mexican reports Josette Monette is a member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa in North Dakota. She has been serving as the deputy secretary since last July and as general counsel since March.
Monette lived briefly in Albuquerque as a child and moved back in 2012 to attend University of New Mexico Law School. Before working for the state, she was the Native American program director for New Mexico Legal Aid. She has also served as a commissioner for the Tesuque Pueblo Gaming Commission and did legal work for Isleta Pueblo.
A number of Indigenous leaders from around the state spoke in support of her at the confirmation hearing.
Monette was appointed secretary-designate in December. She succeeds James Mountain, the former governor of San Ildefonso Pueblo, who never had a confirmation hearing. Advocates for missing and murdered Indigenous women protested his appointment over a 2007 rape allegation.
The GOP-controlled House fails to impeach the homeland security secretary. What could come next? - By Rebecca Santana, Associated Press
The Republican-controlled House has failed to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas over the Biden administration's handling of the U.S.-Mexico border.
The vote Tuesday night marked the culmination of months of examination by House Republicans as they've aimed to make immigration and border security a key election issue.
But when it came down to the vote, Democrats were united against the charges, and Republicans, who have a razor-thin majority in the House, needed almost every vote they had to approve the two articles of impeachment against Mayorkas. They fell short.
This doesn't necessarily spell the end of the impeachment efforts. The House is likely to revisit the issue, but next steps are highly uncertain.
Here's a look at how the House arrived at the impeachment vote and where things go from here:
WHAT'S GOING ON AT THE BORDER?
Migrants have long come across the southern U.S. border looking for a new life in the United States, but not like what's happening now. Arrests for illegal border crossings from Mexico reached an all-time high in December. In fiscal year 2022, Border Patrol encountered 2.2 million people crossing the border illegally. You have to go back decades to see comparable numbers.
Statistics aren't always a perfect measure though. The numbers from the 1990s and 2000s are considered vast undercounts because migrants sought to evade authorities as they entered the U.S.
Decades ago, the typical migrant trying to come to the U.S. was a man from Mexico looking for work, and he tried to dodge Border Patrol agents. That dynamic has changed drastically. Migrants now are still coming from central and south America but they're also coming from much farther away — China, Afghanistan and Mauritania, to name just a few countries. And they're often seeking out Border Patrol agents in an effort to seek protection in America.
The numbers have at times overwhelmed the ability of border officials to handle, leading to temporary closures of border crossings so that officials can process migrants.
It's also had repercussions far from the border. Migrants going to cities like Chicago, New York, Boston and Denver have strained city services, leading to Democratic officials pushing the administration to take action.
WHAT DO REPUBLICANS SAY?
Republicans have laid the blame for all of this on the Homeland Security secretary and said that because of it, he needs to go. They say the Biden administration has either gotten rid of policies that were in place under the Trump administration that were deterring migrants or that the Biden administration implemented policies of its own that have attracted migrants.
The House Homeland Security Committee has been holding hearings over roughly the last year where Republicans have repeatedly lambasted Mayorkas. Witnesses have included an Arizona sheriff, families who have lost loved ones to the fentanyl crisis, experts on constitutional law, and former Homeland Security officials who served under Trump.
U.S. House Republicans say the secretary is violating immigration laws by not detaining enough migrants and by implementing a humanitarian parole program that they say bypasses Congress to allow people into the country who wouldn't otherwise qualify to enter. And they allege that he's lied to Congress when he's said things like the border is secure. All of this together, they argue, has created a prolonged crisis that is having repercussions across the country, is squarely the secretary's fault and warrants impeachment.
"There is no other measure for Congress to take but this one," House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, said Tuesday. "It's an extreme measure, but extreme times call for extreme measures."
WHAT DO MAYORKAS, HIS SUPPORTERS, AND OTHERS SAY?
Democrats and many legal experts have said that this is essentially a policy dispute and that Republicans just don't like the immigration policies that the Biden administration via Mayorkas has implemented. That's an issue for voters to decide, not an issue that meets the level of "high crimes and misdemeanors" required to impeach a Cabinet official, they argue.
"That one congressional party disapproves, even disapproves vigorously, of President Biden's policies on immigration or other matters within the secretary's purview does not make the secretary impeachable," testified University of Missouri law professor Frank O. Bowman during a January committee hearing.
Mayorkas and his supporters have often said that it's not the actions of the administration that are drawing migrants to the southern border, but that it is part of a worldwide phenomenon of migrants, driven by political, economic and climate turmoil, who are more willing to embark on life-threatening journeys to seek out a better life.
They argue the administration has tried to deal with the chaos at the border. Over roughly the last year, Mayorkas has been the public face of a policy that seeks to create pathways for migrants to come to the U.S. such as an app that lets them schedule a time to come to the border and seek entry. And, they argue, that policy has new efforts to limit who can get asylum and to order aggressive deportations.
But the Biden administration and supporters contend that the secretary is dealing with a wildly underfunded and outdated immigration system that only Congress has the power to truly fix. So far, they argue, it hasn't.
WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?
It's not immediately clear. The House is likely to revisit plans to impeach Mayorkas. The final vote was 214-216. Three Republicans opposed the impeachment. A fourth Republican switched his vote so that impeachment could be revisited at a later date. In a dramatic, rowdy scene on the House floor, the vote was tied for several minutes, 215-215. Several Republican lawmakers surrounded one of the holdouts, Wisconsin Republican Mike Gallagher, who refused to change his vote.
Speaking after the vote, Rep. Mark Green, R-Tenn., said he was "frustrated." Green is the chairman of the Homeland Security Committee that brought the articles of impeachment. But Green also said: "We'll see it back again."
If Mayorkas is eventually impeached, the issue would then go to the Senate. That's the body that would decide whether to convict the secretary or not and if he's convicted then Mayorkas is no longer Homeland Security secretary.
But conviction is a much higher bar than impeachment. Democrats control the senate 51-49. Two thirds of the Senate must vote to convict as opposed to the simple majority needed to impeach in the House. That means all Republicans as well as a substantial number of Democrats would have to vote to convict Mayorkas — a highly unlikely scenario considering some Republicans are cool to the idea of impeachment.
Mayorkas has said he's ready to defend himself in the Senate if it comes to a trial. And in the meantime, he says he's doing his job.
"I am totally focused on the work and what we need to get done. And I am not distracted by the politics," Mayorkas said during a recent interview with The Associated Press.