Here comes the judge! Well, not so quickly in federal court in New Mexico. A judicial insider provides insight on why we still have a federal judge shortage, even as the big caseload "drowns" the system. Are New Mexico's two US Senators "slow-rolling" the appointment of new judges? Read on. . .

The District of New Mexico is historically among the busiest federal district courts in the country, in large part because of the high number of drug and immigration cases, and the Bernalillo County District Attorney has been increasingly referring criminal cases for federal, instead of state, prosecution. “We’re drowning" is how in September U.S District Judge Martha Vasquez described the heavy caseload and judge vacancies.

Unfortunately, in the five months since then, nothing much has changed. At that time there were three judicial vacancies. The President had nominated Judge Kea Riggs of Roswell for an Albuquerque vacancy, and U.S. Magistrate Judge Kevin Sweazea for a Las Cruces vacancy. The third vacancy, in Albuquerque, was still in the application process. Judge Riggs assumed office on December 31st, which now leaves two judicial vacancies here. The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts considers these vacancies a “judicial emergency.”

The second nominee, Sweazea, has since withdrawn his name from consideration after receiving a phone call from Senator Tom Udall’s office informing him that New Mexico’s two senators would no longer support his nomination—despite having submitted Sweazea’s name to the President on their approved list of potential nominees.

So, that leaves New Mexico—one of the busiest U.S. District courts in the country—two judges down and in the middle of a “judicial emergency.” And because of the secretive and confusing nature of federal judicial appointments, the citizens of New Mexico are left in the dark with no real way of getting a straight answer on what is being done to get us out of this emergency. There are only two people in this state that hold the answers: Senators Udall and Martin Heinrich.

Our two Senators have been engaged in an application process for the Albuquerque vacancy since May 6th of last year and presumably have developed a list of names, but have yet to send the names to the President. The application process for the other vacancy—the Las Cruces vacancy, following Sweazea’s withdrawal—is likely back at square one. 

Because there are no Republicans involved in the process, and because the general public typically has limited knowledge on what goes into the nomination process, Senators Udall and Heinrich are able to slow-roll this nomination process—likely in an effort to hold the two vacancies open for the next year with the expectation that there will be a new Democratic president—without answering why they are putting politics over the safety of our communities and placing party loyalty over helping a drowning U.S. District Court.

I urge you to reach out to the Senators’ offices to find out where the application process stands and I also urge you to ask point blank if the Senators intend to hold the judicial vacancies open until next year—through delay or otherwise—at which time, the process would have to begin anew, and the people of our state would have to continue to live with a “judicial emergency/' New Mexicans deserve to know if our Senators are playing politics with our safety and with our future. 

Interesting and important insights there. Okay, Senators Udall and  Heinrich, why shouldn't you be taken to the woodshed over this? Inquiring minds want to know.

THE APD FADE

Geier and Keller (Journal)

What's with all the unanswered questions surrounding the many murders in ABQ? That's the question this Senior Alligator tackles:

Something is very wrong at APD and City Hall. Possible murders are faded by Mayor Keller and Chief Geier. Clearly they are afraid the murder numbers for 2019 are much higher than they originally reported. They waited until February 2020 to admit that 4 year old James Dunklee was murdered in December. Now we discover that 2 deaths (Adam Perry and Lawson Reeves) who were found dead in November are possibly murders too! And how many times will we see media reports of the murder victims families complaining that APD will not tell them anything, have not solved their case or that APD has arrested an innocent person? 

Albuquerque is falling apart because of crime and not one of our elected officials or chief of police are willing to answer hard questions about APD not doing it’s job to protect the citizens. APD's Homicide Unit has a horrible clearance rate. There are hundreds of APD cold cases that will never be worked. Keller and Geier need to be honest with the citizens. There is a problem at APD Homicide. Geier is going to walk away next year with a pension of over $150,000 per year! He should at least answer some tough questions before he leaves.

Where is the city council? They seem to be ghosts who “know nothing, do nothing and say nothing.” The media needs to start hounding them to do their damn jobs and start overseeing APD. 

The council should demand that Geier appear for questions at the next council meeting and demand to know why Geier ignored the Civilian Oversight Commission recommendation to terminate PIO Simon Drobik. 

--Demand to know why Geier has not opened an investigation into the false arrest of Gisele Estrada (the 17 year old falsely accused of murder)? 

--Demand to know why the Dunklee murder wasn’t reported as a murder until 3 months later? 

--Demand to know what the status is of the Perry and Reeves deaths and why APD won’t release information? 

--Demand to know why the death at 219 Utah NE (November 2019) was not investigated as a murder and why Chief Geier and his staff were consulted before the decision not to make it a murder investigation was done? 

--Demand to know why APD  won't allow BCSO and NMSP to assist in murder investigations? 

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(c)NM POLITICS WITH JOE MONAHAN 2019