{"id":17873,"date":"2010-05-27T13:34:54","date_gmt":"2010-05-27T19:34:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=17873"},"modified":"2010-05-27T17:39:25","modified_gmt":"2010-05-27T23:39:25","slug":"hispanic-group-says-disciplinary-board-unfairly-targeting-montoya","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2010\/05\/hispanic-group-says-disciplinary-board-unfairly-targeting-montoya\/","title":{"rendered":"Hispanic group says disciplinary board unfairly targeting Montoya"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_16899\"  class=\"wp-caption module image alignright\" style=\"max-width: 275px;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-16899\" title=\"Montoya, Dennis W.\" src=\"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/Montoya-Dennis-W..jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"275\" height=\"249\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dennis W. Montoya<\/p><\/div>\n<p>The state chapter of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.lulac.org\/\">League of United Latin American Citizens<\/a> has accused the state Supreme Court\u2019s disciplinary board of unfairly targeting appeals judge candidate <a href=\"http:\/\/www.denniswmontoya.com\/\">Dennis W. Montoya<\/a> \u2013 an allegation the head of the disciplinary board says is false.<\/p>\n<p>The state disciplinary board has asked the Supreme Court to\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2010\/05\/high-court-asked-to-immediately-suspend-montoya\/\">immediately suspend<\/a> Montoya because of multiple complaints. The board has formally\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2010\/05\/judicial-candidate-formally-accused-of-misconduct\/\">accused Montoya of misconduct<\/a> including fraud, deceit, lying to the court, having a conflict of interest, failing to adequately represent a client and failing to adequately account for and distinguish client funds from his own.<\/p>\n<p>That comes as Montoya is trying to unseat Appeals Judge <a href=\"http:\/\/www.votevanzi.com\/\">Linda Vanzi<\/a> in the Democratic primary, but the disciplinary board\u2019s investigation that has resulted in formal charges was initiated long before Montoya was a candidate.<\/p>\n<p>Still, LULAC takes issue with the situation, the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.abqjournal.com\/news\/state\/27020561244newsstate05-27-10.htm\">Albuquerque Journal<\/a> is reporting. The group says the board\u2019s actions are biased.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>\u201c\u2026 there is serious question as to the motivation underlying these actions, which are taken immediately before the primary election and have been followed by immediate press stories and literature pieces attacking Mr. Montoya. We cannot stand idly by and allow the courts of New Mexico to be used for<br \/>\nthe purposes of depriving the people of the State of New Mexico of a fair and open<br \/>\nelection,\u201d a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.denniswmontoya.com\/LULAC.html\">news release<\/a> from LULAC states.<\/p>\n<p>Virginia Ferrera, the board\u2019s chief counsel, \u201cdenied the assertion that Montoya\u2019s ethnicity played a role in the allegations levied against him and pointed out there are many Hispanic judges in New Mexico,\u201d the Journal article states.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis has nothing to do with politics,\u201d Ferrera was quoted by the Journal as saying. \u201cWe\u2019re simply out to protect the public.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>LULAC called for state and federal investigations of what it called potential \u201cdirty tricks.\u201d The Journal quoted a spokeswoman for the state attorney general as saying the complaint had been received and would be reviewed.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Update, 5:40 p.m.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>It should be noted that Montoya is <a href=\"http:\/\/www.newmexicolulac.org\/contact.html\">LULAC\u2019s legal adviser<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>UPDATED: The state chapter of the League of United Latin American Citizens has accused the state Supreme Court\u2019s disciplinary board of unfairly targeting appeals judge candidate Dennis W. Montoya \u2013 an allegation the head of the disciplinary board says is false.<\/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":[108,161],"class_list":["post-17873","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","category-uncategorized","tag-2010-election","tag-judiciary"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17873","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=17873"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17873\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17873"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17873"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17873"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}