{"id":10004,"date":"2009-12-04T13:00:34","date_gmt":"2009-12-04T20:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=10004"},"modified":"2009-12-07T16:32:27","modified_gmt":"2009-12-07T23:32:27","slug":"investment-council-can%e2%80%99t-locate-documents","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2009\/12\/investment-council-can%e2%80%99t-locate-documents\/","title":{"rendered":"Investment council can\u2019t locate documents"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Photo

Photo by lotyloty\/flickr.com<\/p><\/div>\n

The State Investment Council<\/a> (SIC) says it can\u2019t locate a subpoena and questionnaire that were missing from a group of public records released last month related to ongoing federal probes into the nationwide investment scandal.<\/p>\n

The SIC released four documents<\/a> to the media last month in response to records requests: Two were subpoenas issued by a grand jury convened by the U.S. attorney. A third was a subpoena for records issued by the U.S Securities and Exchange Commission. The fourth was an Aug. 20 letter<\/a> to then-State Investment Officer Gary Bland notifying him that an \u201cenclosed subpoena\u201d required him to testify before the SEC in Denver and asking him to fill out and return an \u201cenclosed background questionnaire.\u201d<\/p>\n

Problem is, the subpoena and questionnaire referred to in the letter weren\u2019t included in the package of documents released to the media. Asked about that, spokesman Charles Wollmann said the SIC believes the documents are public records, but it can\u2019t locate them.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have everything that we have. It\u2019s not that we\u2019re trying to hide anything,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Wollmann said the intent of the subpoena is clear from the Aug. 20 letter that was released to the media: The SEC wanted Bland\u2019s testimony in its investigation of the state\u2019s public investment funds. Whether the missing documents would shed additional light on the situation isn\u2019t clear.<\/p>\n

Regardless, Sarah Welsh, executive director of the New Mexico Foundation for Open Government<\/a>, said the situation \u201cpoints to a larger issue\u201d \u2013 records retention.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn order for the public to access public records, agencies have to hang on to them,\u201d she said, adding that, for various reasons, \u201ca lot of times public records can\u2019t be located because they no longer exist.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s concerning that this public record vanished,\u201d Welsh said.<\/p>\n

Wollman said he could come up with two possibilities for what happened. He said Bland may be in possession of the documents. Or, he said, perhaps the SEC referred to the attachments in its Aug. 20 letter but did not actually send the attachments.<\/p>\n

Bland could not immediately be reached for comment. His answering machine\u2019s memory was full and would not allow NMPolitics.net to leave a message.<\/p>\n

The scandal\u2019s history<\/h3>\n

Bland resigned<\/a> in October in the midst of the national investment scandal that is the subject of criminal and other investigations in New Mexico, New York and elsewhere.<\/p>\n

Already, Saul Meyer, the former investment adviser to the SIC and New Mexico Educational Retirement Board, has admitted to recommending \u201cinvestments that were pushed on him by politically-connected individuals in New Mexico\u201d in\u00a0pleading guilty<\/a> to unrelated charges in New York. Meyer is reportedly\u00a0cooperating with investigators<\/a> in New Mexico.<\/p>\n

Bland\u2019s resignation, according to SIC Member Pat Lyons, the state land commissioner, came after SIC members learned that he\u00a0had pressured investment firms<\/a> to hire certain third-party marketers. Those third-party marketers \u2013 or \u201cplacement agents\u201d who help investment firms get lucrative state contracts for a fee \u2013 are at the center of the scandal in New York and New Mexico.<\/p>\n

Marc Correra, a placement agent who has shared in as much as $22 million in placement fees<\/a> during Gov. Bill Richardson\u2019s tenure, is among those who the SEC has sought information about in the course of its investigation.<\/p>\n

Correra is the son of Anthony Correra, a prominent Richardson donor and friend who\u2019s also been dragged into the controversy because he was involved in the hiring of Bland at the SIC.<\/p>\n

Neither Correra has been publicly accused of wrongdoing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The State Investment Council says it can\u2019t locate a subpoena and questionnaire that were missing from a group of public records released last month related to ongoing federal probes into the nationwide investment scandal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,1],"tags":[123,111,114,107],"class_list":["post-10004","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","category-uncategorized","tag-investment-scandal","tag-open-government","tag-public-corruption","tag-roundhouse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10004","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10004"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10004\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10004"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10004"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10004"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}