Hicks won’t answer questions about office supply deal

Janetta Hicks

Janetta Hicks, whose home business used to sell supplies to District Attorney Susana Martinez’s office while she was an employee in that office, is refusing to answer NMPolitics.net’s questions about the situation.

I had some follow-up questions for Hicks, who is now the district attorney in Southeastern New Mexico, after reading her comments in a Roswell Daily Record article regarding the situation.

The Albuquerque Journal was first to report that Martinez’s office had purchased more than $60,000 in office supplies from Hicks’ company. At the time, Hicks was one of the top employees in the office. Martinez has defended the arrangement as legal, and though the Journal questioned in its initial article whether the deal violated state law, a follow up article pointed out that a current law barring such arrangements wasn’t in place at the time of the purchases from 2003 to 2005.

The Journal reported that Hicks didn’t respond to its requests for comment. But Hicks was quoted by the Daily Record as saying the deal was “perfectly appropriate” and that supplies were purchased from her only when she could offer the cheapest price. She said she sold supplies to other clients, but refused to name any except to say she primarily worked with district attorney offices.

Even then, she wouldn’t specify which DA offices.

“There’s been too much tension and I don’t want to name other clients,” the newspaper quoted Hicks as saying.

I still had some questions, so I left a phone message with Hicks and sent her these questions in an e-mail on Monday:

How were you able to offer the cheapest prices to the Third Judicial District Attorney’s Office? I ask because I haven’t seen this explained anywhere. What allowed you to offer better deals than the office could get elsewhere?
The business has been described in the media as an office supply business, but it was really more than that, it appears, because most office supply business don’t carry items such as body armor. Was this a business tailored specifically for law enforcement agencies?
I know you said you didn’t want to name any other clients besides Martinez’s office, but would you be willing to name other clients that are government agencies since that information is public record? If not, can you tell me what types of organizations you did business with besides other district attorney offices? Were there other government agencies? Private companies?
You were quoted by the Roswell paper as saying your business arrangement with the DA’s office was “perfectly appropriate.” But the Legislature and governor decided in 2007 that such deals were not appropriate and changed the law to make them illegal. Do you agree with that action by the Legislature and governor, or do you think such dealings should still be legal today?

Hicks’ response, which came this morning via e-mail: