Photo courtesy lotyloty/flickr.com
You may recall that my business, Haussamen Publications, filed a lawsuit in April seeking the release of subpoenas received by the New Mexico Finance Authority (NMFA) during the investigation into allegations of pay to play in the Richardson administration involving CDR Financial Products.
The lawsuit came after the NMFA refused to release copies of the subpoenas in February in response to a records request.
Well, after the probe ended last month without charges being filed, I decided to re-request copies of the subpoenas to see if the agency’s position on whether they were public records had changed.
It had. On Friday, the NMFA provided me with copies of two subpoenas it had received. You can read them by clicking here and here. You can also click here to read the letter that accompanied the subpoenas.
There’s nothing all that earth-shattering in the subpoenas, especially now that the probe has ended. Most of the names are familiar. Among the records the grand jury sought: anything related to the selection of CDR for the lucrative state bond contract, documents related to a finance council set up by the governor and correspondence with a reporter at Bloomberg who first wrote about the CDR deal in late 2006.
The lawsuit filed by my business had contended that any subpoenas NMFA received in the federal probe should be public — regardless of whether there was an ongoing investigation — and noted that the governor’s office released such a document in response to an identical request while the probe was ongoing.
In denying my original request, Reynold Romero, the NMFA’s general counsel, had written that “release of the requested documents could compromise or impede an ongoing federal investigation.” In an interview before the lawsuit was filed, Romero told me his denial wasn’t based on any of the specific exemptions to the state’s Inspection of Public Records Act. He instead cited the provision that allows exemptions “as otherwise provided by law.”
I still contend that NMFA should have released the subpoenas months ago. But at least the public can see them now.