{"id":22588,"date":"2010-10-19T08:17:28","date_gmt":"2010-10-19T14:17:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=22588"},"modified":"2010-10-20T08:15:05","modified_gmt":"2010-10-20T14:15:05","slug":"king-touts-improvements-in-ag%e2%80%99s-office","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2010\/10\/king-touts-improvements-in-ag%e2%80%99s-office\/","title":{"rendered":"King touts improvements in AG\u2019s office"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_14276\"  class=\"wp-caption module image alignright\" style=\"max-width: 270px;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-14276 \" title=\"King, Gary\" src=\"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/King-Gary-300x243.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"270\" height=\"219\" srcset=\"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/King-Gary-300x243.jpg 300w, https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/King-Gary.jpg 325w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 270px) 100vw, 270px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Attorney General Gary King (Photo by Heath Haussamen)<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Attorney General <a href=\"http:\/\/garyking2010.com\/\">Gary King<\/a> says he\u2019s focused during his first term on making the office one that is respected, honest, ethical and doing high-quality work.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are the law firm for the State of New Mexico, and I think we should have the state\u2019s best lawyers,\u201d King, a Democrat, said during a recent interview in Las Cruces.<\/p>\n<p>He acknowledged that the office doesn\u2019t pay as much as many private law firms, but said lawyers have the opportunity to work on some high-profile cases and make a difference, which has attracted quality attorneys.<\/p>\n<p>King said he\u2019s made significant improvements in the office during his first term:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The office\u2019s focus on combating Internet crimes against children has helped lead to a huge spike in the number of cases that are prosecuted in New Mexico.<\/li>\n<li>The state was on \u201chigh-risk\u201d status for Medicaid fraud when King took office in 2007, but the office has focused on prosecuting such cases, and the state recently earned a new, less-worrisome designation from the federal government.<\/li>\n<li>The office has new special prosecutors focused on domestic violence and DWI.<\/li>\n<li>The AG has a new governmental accountability unit that focuses on public corruption and related issues.<\/li>\n<li>The office has a greater focus on combating use of methamphetamines.<\/li>\n<li>Outreach to youth about how to be safe has increased.<\/li>\n<li>The AG\u2019s consumer affairs unit is more effective and professional in its dealings with people.<\/li>\n<li>The quality of representation of state agencies has improved.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>King said his office has improved in all of those areas while seeing 10 percent of its budget be cut in the last three years.<\/p>\n<p>That doesn\u2019t mean every area of the office is more efficient. The cuts are obvious in some areas, King said. For example, it takes the office significantly longer to respond to legislators\u2019 requests for legal opinions than when he first took office because resources have been diverted elsewhere.<\/p>\n<h3>Public corruption cases<\/h3>\n<p>King\u2019s GOP opponent, <a href=\"http:\/\/mattchandler2010.com\/\">Matt Chandler<\/a>, and other Republicans have accused King of being soft on corruption. King defended his record in <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2010\/10\/addressing-corruption-in-new-mexico\/\">a recent guest column<\/a> published on this site.<\/p>\n<p>The most high-profile cases King\u2019s office has brought \u2013 against Public Regulation Commissioner <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2010\/02\/judge-dismisses-some-charges-against-prc%E2%80%99s-block-and-his-father\/\">Jerome Block Jr.<\/a> and his father, former Secretary of State <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2009\/08\/prosecutors-allege-the-theft-of-millions-of-dollars\/\">Rebecca Vigil-Giron<\/a> and others, and former Region III Housing Authority Director <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2009\/06\/a-primer-on-new-mexicos-housing-authority-scandal\/\">Vincent \u201cSmiley\u201d Gallegos<\/a> and others \u2013 are all bogged down by legal questions.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>In the Block case, some charges were dismissed because the judge ruled that King overstepped his authority with the indictments. His office is appealing. In the other two, defendants are questioning whether King\u2019s office can represent a state agency in a civil capacity and criminally prosecute officials from that office. King says there\u2019s no conflict, but the question is awaiting a ruling from the appeals court.<\/p>\n<p>King said no court has ever ruled on the question about a potential conflict between the civil and criminal divisions in his office \u2013 which indicates that very few public corruption cases has ever been brought this far in New Mexico\u2019s history.<\/p>\n<p>The statute under which the Blocks are charged is relatively new, so no court has ever ruled on the pending question in that case, either.<\/p>\n<p>So while others say King isn\u2019t doing enough to combat corruption, King contends that his office is taking these cases further than most attorneys general have done in the past.<\/p>\n<h3>How bad is corruption in NM?<\/h3>\n<p>Republicans regularly use the term \u201cculture of corruption\u201d to describe government in New Mexico. King takes issue with calling it a \u201cculture,\u201d saying that term is \u201ctoo broad\u201d and implies that every government official is corrupt.<\/p>\n<p>King, who has access to more information about actual corruption than most New Mexicans, says corruption is a \u201csubstantial problem,\u201d and he said there is \u201csignificant corruption\u201d here.<\/p>\n<p>However, he said, most government employees and officials are hardworking and trying to do their jobs well. King said his focus isn\u2019t on using politically charged terms, but is instead on finding those individuals who are corrupt and prosecuting them.<\/p>\n<p>Even though those three high-profile cases haven\u2019t yet resulted in convictions, King said the indictments have had an impact. He said he believes officials are working harder to try to comply with state laws.<\/p>\n<p>King said there are two types of corruption in New Mexico. The first is traditional pay to play \u2013 in which an official pockets money in exchange for an official action. There\u2019s lots of public support for such cases, King said.<\/p>\n<p>King called the second the \u201cthis-is-the-way-that-we\u2019ve-always-done-things-in-New-Mexico-and-we-don\u2019t-want-to-change-it\u201d corruption. He cited the case against former State Treasurer Robert Vigil as an example. The jury saw video of Vigil taking money, but Vigil argued that it was a campaign contribution and a jury failed to convict him on most of the charges he faced.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThose cases are much more difficult, I think \u2013 the ones where it looks like something that\u2019s been accepted practice in New Mexico, and we\u2019re trying to change that practice,\u201d King said. He added that campaign contribution limits that take effect after the current election cycle will help with situations like Vigil\u2019s.<\/p>\n<p>I asked whether King has ever received pressure from high-ranking officials to back off a corruption investigation. He said he\u2019s often asked when his office indicts someone why they are doing it. King said he\u2019s also received pressure \u201cin certain instances\u201d that \u201cwas a little more severe.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>However, that pressure didn\u2019t rise to the level of criminal activity, King said, or he would have indicted the person who was applying the pressure.<\/p>\n<h3>Legislative changes<\/h3>\n<p>King said he plans to keep pushing during another term as attorney general for the creation of a state ethics commission that would investigate complaints of ethical violations and educate officials on what\u2019s acceptable behavior.<\/p>\n<p>And he will push for other changes. King wants the ethical requirements in the Governmental Conduct Act to apply to all government officials in New Mexico. Currently, the law governing ethical behavior applies to state workers but not local governments.<\/p>\n<p>King said there are other areas in law where he will ask the Legislature to clean up language so his office can prosecute cases.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Attorney General Gary King says he\u2019s focused during his first term on making the office one that is respected, honest, ethical and doing high-quality work.<\/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":[108,114,107],"class_list":["post-22588","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","category-uncategorized","tag-2010-election","tag-public-corruption","tag-roundhouse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22588","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=22588"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22588\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}