Amy Orlando
The state’s district attorneys have agreed to take a company that provides a victim notification system up on its offer to continue the service for two months for free while they seek other funding to keep the system going.
District Attorneys Matt Chandler from Clovis and Amy Orlando from Las Cruces confirmed that they and their colleagues reversed an earlier decision to shut down part of the system.
As NMPolitics.net reported on Thursday, district attorneys were scrambling to save the VINE, or Victim Information and Notification Everyday, system, which provides automated notification to victims and others about defendants’ incarceration status and court hearings. Earlier this year, Gov. Susana Martinez pocket vetoed a funding bill she said was flawed.
Federal funding for the separate courts and jails systems ended Thursday. The district attorneys had previously voted to take the company that provides the system up on its offer to keep the jail system going for two free months while they sought other funding. But they voted to shut down the courts system as of Thursday and develop their own, scaled-back system in-house.
Matt Chandler
Some, including Chandler and Orlando, weren’t happy with the plan to shut down the court notification system. Chandler asked for a revote on Wednesday, and the two were successful in their efforts to get a majority of the state’s 14 district attorneys to vote to keep both systems going while they search for other funding.
“I will continue to fight for sustainable victim notification programs, ensuring that victims within my district are always notified of their court proceedings and the status of their offender, as that is of the utmost importance,” Orlando said. “I am confident that all those concerned can come together to make this happen in a way that benefits everyone involved.”
Chandler said keeping the court notification system operational “is a small victory for victims that are subjected to the criminal justice system.”
“This will allow victims that are registered with VINE to continue to receive court notification without interruption, giving us time to seek a long-term solution to either fully fund VINE or find an alternative method to keep victims in the know,” he said.
Vote breakdown kept secret
Mary Lynne Newell, The Silver City area district attorney and president of the state’s DAs, refused to release information about how each DA voted on the original vote and the re-vote sought by Chandler.
“The point is we abide by majority vote, and always have,” she wrote in an e-mail. “We are an amicable bunch and we aim to keep it that way.”
NMPolitics.net asked in a follow-up e-mail for Newell’s opinion on whether the votes are subject to the Open Meetings or Inspection of Public Records acts. But she’s on vacation and hasn’t yet responded.