{"id":158639,"date":"2016-06-08T00:35:43","date_gmt":"2016-06-08T06:35:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=158639"},"modified":"2016-06-08T00:35:43","modified_gmt":"2016-06-08T06:35:43","slug":"dantonio-wins-dona-ana-county-democratic-da-primary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2016\/06\/dantonio-wins-dona-ana-county-democratic-da-primary\/","title":{"rendered":"D’Antonio wins Do\u00f1a Ana County Democratic DA primary"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Mark

Cassie McClure \/ NMPolitics.net<\/p>

Do\u00f1a Ana County District Attorney Mark D’Antonio, center, watched election returns Tuesday with State Sen. Joseph Cervantes, top center, and others.<\/p><\/div>\n

Incumbent Do\u00f1a Ana County District Attorney Mark D\u2019Antonio held off challenger James Dickens in the Democratic primary on Tuesday in spite of Dickens\u2019 claims<\/a> that D\u2019Antonio has been soft on crime and failed to adequately prosecute cases.<\/p>\n

With all polling places reporting, D\u2019Antonio won 59 percent of the vote in the Third Judicial District Attorney Democratic primary to Dickens\u2019 41 percent.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a difference in philosophy,\u201d D\u2019Antonio said earlier in the evening, before results were final, at his watch party, which was held at the campaign headquarters for Merrie Lee Soules, the Democratic candidate for New Mexico\u2019s 2nd\u00a0Congressional District seat in the U.S. House.<\/p>\n

The atmosphere was light even before any results came in, but became more energetic throughout the night as supporters filed in. State Sen. Joseph Cervantes was among those making an appearance to check in the numbers.<\/p>\n

D\u2019Antonio will face Republican Brad Cates, a former state and federal prosecutor and state representative, in November. While D\u2019Antonio and Dickens lobbed allegations and even formal ethics complaints<\/a> at each other during the primary, Cates has faced his own controversy<\/a> over racy photos on his business website that led some New Mexican Republicans to withdraw their support.<\/p>\n

Dickens and D\u2019Antonio clashed on several fronts during the primary, with Dickens shining a harsh light on D\u2019Antonio\u2019s rate of pleading out, dismissing and losing cases<\/a>. On the day he defeated Dickens, D\u2019Antonio\u2019s office was hit with a mistrial<\/a> in the murder case against Tai Chan, a police officer accused of gunning down fellow officer Jeremy Martin. But D\u2019Antonio said he was committed to seeing the case through to a conclusion.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll jurors agreed to convict Tai Chan but could not agree to which degree of criminal homicide,\u201d D\u2019Antonio said in a statement to the media. \u201cWe plan on retrying the case as soon as the court can set a date and will continue to pursue the best result for Jeremy Martin and his family.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dickens was optimistic earlier Tuesday evening, surrounded by friends and family at his home. His tone changed after the results came in.<\/p>\n

\u201cI couldn\u2019t be happier with the enthusiasm that I was met with when I walked in the community, talked to victims, met with law enforcement. Obviously this did not translate into a winning campaign,\u201d said Dickens, a prosecutor in the 12th Judicial District based in Alamogordo whose boss there David Ceballes lost his own Republican primary on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut this campaign was never about me — it was standing up for the victims and the victims\u2019 rights in the community, so they know that somebody was supporting them,” Dickens said.<\/p>\n

At D\u2019Antonio\u2019s watch party, supporters were happy to see D\u2019Antonio in the lead. \u201cThere was a lot of bickering back and forth,\u201d said Art Archuleta, who voted for D\u2019Antonio. \u201cBut Mark had to do a lot to clean up the mess that was there (in the DA\u2019s office before he was elected in 2012) and now he\u2019s really getting his momentum.\u201d<\/p>\n

Archuleta said he and his wife Cecelia believe D\u2019Antonio made the effort to get out to communities like Tortugas, where they live.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Incumbent Do\u00f1a Ana County District Attorney Mark D\u2019Antonio held off challenger James Dickens in the Democratic primary on Tuesday in spite of Dickens\u2019 claims that D\u2019Antonio has been soft on crime and failed to adequately prosecute cases.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2960,"featured_media":158641,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[708,142,115,203],"class_list":["post-158639","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-2016-election","tag-crime","tag-dona-ana-county","tag-law-enforcement"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158639","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\/2960"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=158639"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158639\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/158641"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=158639"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=158639"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=158639"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}