NEWS
PAGE 6 • December 17, 2014 • ABQ FREE PRESS
Bill Would Change How Police Shootings are Investigated BY RENE THOMPSON
L
egislation being pushed by Albuquerque City Councilor Diane Gibson proposes that the New Mexico Attorney General’s Office – not local district attorneys – investigate cases in which police officers are accused of violent crimes or sexual felonies. Gibson’s bill seeks to re-establish public trust in the investigative process and remove the appearance of a conflict of interest when local prosecutors are asked to investigate police officers on whom they rely to do their day-to-day jobs. Gibson said she started working on the proposal more than a year ago. “At the time, there was a lot of talk about the police shootings, but you could see things had been ramping up for a long while,” she said. She took her proposal to the Legislature’s Interim Courts, Corrections and Justice Committee, headed by State Rep. Gale Chasey, an Albuquerque Democrat, which endorsed it. In 41 police shootings in Albuquerque since 2010, 27 deaths resulted. No indictments or criminal charges have been filed against any of the officers involved. “There’s a relationship formed there – there has to be, they work together, so to relieve that responsibility from the DA’s office and shift it to the AG’s office would be a good thing. The Attorney General’s Office has a little more space between their offices and local
law enforcement,” Gibson said. Albuquerque civil rights attorney Randi McGinn, who filed a civil lawsuit against the Albuquerque Police Department on behalf of Christopher Torres’ family, said the bill would be a good start. Torres was killed in 2011 when he was shot three times in the back by an APD police officer. The Bernalillo County District Attorney’s Office declined to pursue criminal charges against the two plainclothes detectives involved. McGinn would go a step further. She believes police shooting cases should be heard at “public preliminary hearings by a judge, instead of in secret grand jury proceedings.” That would allow evidence to be presented in public instead of in the secrecy of a grand jury, she said. The lack of transparency of grand jury proceedings has led to a public outcry in high-profile homicide cases involving Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., and Eric Garner in New York City, McGinn said. “Had they done it publicly in some of these recent cases, we would know and be able to have an informed opinion on whether or not they should have indicted them,” McGinn said. “We’re seeing people rioting in the streets because people are beginning to believe that the law doesn’t apply equally to police officers and ordinary citizens and that police officers essentially get
a pass when they kill somebody,” McGinn said. A former assistant Bernalillo County district attorney said the relationship between police officers and prosecutors creates a problem in police shooting cases. “Prosecutors get all their cases from police, and it’s the police who are their important witnesses,” said the former prosecutor, who asked not to be identified. “Is that relationship going to affect people’s perception of legitimacy?” Prosecutors also are in total control of the grand jury process, the former ADA said, adding that prosecutors decide which cases to bring to a grand jury and which witnesses to call. Secret grand jury proceedings make it easier for a prosecutor who doesn’t want to see an officer indicted. The prosecutor can lob easy questions at pro-police witnesses and difficult ones at those who are hostile to an officer, the former ADA added. McGinn believes that in Torres’ case, if anyone other than a police officer had shot Torres three times in the back, regardless of whether it was in self defense, they would have been indicted and prosecuted for the crime of killing an unarmed person. Rene Thompson is a journalism intern with ABQ Free Press.
RIO RANCHO PUMPING, Page 5 City of Albuquerque. The San Juan-Chama project diverts water from the Colorado River Basin through tunnels beneath the Continental Divide and dumps it into the Rio Grande Basin. The water utility takes that water out of the river, treats it and sends it on to customers. Basically, the San Juan-Chama Diversion Project takes water destined to end up in the Pacific Ocean and funnels it through the Rio Grande to the Gulf of Mexico. Because it is not entitled to river water, Rio Rancho relies solely on groundwater, a situation that isn’t likely to change anytime soon. But Stomp said that now is the time for both Rio Rancho and the Albuquerque Bernalillo County water utility to begin looking for outside sources of water, and not just water rights along the Rio Grande. “We need to find new sources of water,” Stomp said, adding that those new sources will probably mean importing water to the area from other water basins.
decreased by nine billion gallons a year, said the utility’s water conservation officer Year Gallons Delivered Population Katherine Yuhas. In 1995, the water authority 1995 41 billion 445,167 delivered 41 billion gallons of water. This year it is on track to come in at 32 billion gal2013 32 billion 643,881 lons, Yuhas said. That’s despite an increase 2014 (projected) 31.5 billion 643,881 in population from 445,000 to 643,000, she Rio Rancho pumping said. Year Gallons Delivered Population The use of the San Juan-Chama water 2012 4.78 billion 90,775 and reduced groundwater pumping comes 2013 4.15 billion 91,956 with other benefits, Stomp said. Because of reduced pumping, the city will eventually Per person per day water usage in the water utility’s service area have to put less water back into the river from (Bernalillo County) its wastewater treatment plant. Currently, the 1995 250 gallons water utility pumps and diverts about 100,000 2013 135 gallons acre feet of water a year. About 60 percent of Per person per day water usage in Rio Rancho that is returned to the river, compared to 50 2000 188.36 gallons percent 10 years ago, Stomp said. 2013 136.21 gallons In ten more years, the Water Authority Sources: Albuquerque Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority, City of Rio Rancho, U.S. Census Bureau will be able to reduce its return flows to the river by 10,000 acre feet, Stomp added. That The Albuquerque Bernalillo County water utility treated water can be injected into the aquifer began diverting that water 45 years later, he said. for use at a later date, he said. That gives the water utility an extra 10,000 acre feet of water a year. In 20 Some good news years, if all goes well, the water authority will have ‘I have heard concerns about Despite four years of drought and Rio Rancho’s an extra 20,000 acre feet, Stomp said. the inordinate amount of pumping, water table levels in the Albuquerque area “We are not done yet, but no one else in the world have generally risen by 20 to 55 feet since the City of has done what this community has done [in terms of water that is being pumped Albuquerque started drawing and treating drinking water conservation] and reuse,” Stomp said. [by Rio Rancho]’ water from its San Juan-Chama allotment flowing Despite that good news, Rio Rancho, which is – City Councilor Rey Garduño in the Rio Grande in late 2008. This year, 60 percent projected to grow to 151,000 residents by 2040, has of the water utility’s water supply will come from to do something else besides pump more and more surface water, Stomp said. Water rights broker Turner agreed. “Usually, large groundwater, Stomp emphasized. And since 1995, water use by the nearly 650,000 water projects take 50 years to come into play,” Turner “They need to find a means to use less groundwawater users in the water utility’s service area has said. “San Juan-Chama was first authorized in 1963.” ter,” Stomp said. – Dennis Domrzalski Albuquerque Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority water usage