{"id":25632,"date":"2011-02-01T11:49:02","date_gmt":"2011-02-01T18:49:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=25632"},"modified":"2011-02-01T11:52:05","modified_gmt":"2011-02-01T18:52:05","slug":"appeals-court-ag-can-prosecute-housing-authority-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2011\/02\/appeals-court-ag-can-prosecute-housing-authority-case\/","title":{"rendered":"Appeals court: AG can prosecute housing authority case"},"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>The N.M. Court of Appeals has ruled that Attorney General <a href=\"http:\/\/nmag.gov\/office\/Divisions\/EO\/kingbio.aspx\">Gary King<\/a> can prosecute the defendants in a case <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2009\/06\/a-primer-on-new-mexicos-housing-authority-scandal\/\">involving the state\u2019s housing authorities<\/a> even though his office also represents the authorities in a civil capacity.<\/p>\n<p>The ruling is significant because it\u2019s the first time the appeals court has ruled on whether the attorney general can wear both civil and criminal hats when there\u2019s a potential conflict between the two. The defendants in the housing authority case could still appeal the ruling to the state Supreme Court.<\/p>\n<p>An appeal to the state\u2019s high court would further delay trial.<\/p>\n<p>King\u2019s spokesman, Phil Sisneros, confirmed the ruling from the appeals court, but he provided no additional details. One of the defendants, Robert Strumor, would say only that he has \u201cbeen wrongfully accused of crimes that never occurred and I will continue to mount a vigorous defense.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Former Region III Housing Authority Director Vincent \u201cSmiley\u201d Gallegos, former Region III accountant Dennis M. Kennedy, and Strumor, a bond attorney, are facing felony charges including fraud and money laundering. A fourth defendant, former Region III attorney David N. Hernandez, is charged with tampering with evidence.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Defendants in the housing authority case and another high-profile case <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2009\/08\/prosecutors-allege-the-theft-of-millions-of-dollars\/\">against former Secretary of State Rebecca Vigil-Giron<\/a> have said King\u2019s attorney\/client relationship with state agencies creates a conflict when he has to investigate corruption allegations involving one of those agencies.<\/p>\n<p>King defends his office by saying that a\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2010\/09\/%E2%80%98chinese-wall%E2%80%99-prevents-conflicts-in-corruption-cases-ag-says\/print\/\">\u201cChinese wall\u201d\u00a0exists<\/a> between his civil and criminal divisions. The civil divisions report to King, and the criminal investigations and prosecutions divisions report to Chief Deputy Attorney General Al Lama.<\/p>\n<p>The AG told NMPolitics.net last year that his office is fighting the conflict-of-interest allegations in both cases because he believes it is \u201ctime to draw the line and say look, this is what has to be done to go after these cases.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>King pointed to the housing authority case and the case against Vigil-Giron as evidence that his office can bring forth public corruption indictments even when the office\u2019s civil side is involved in attorney\/client issues with the agencies the criminal side is investigating.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Court of Appeals has ruled that Attorney General Gary King can prosecute the defendants in a case involving the state\u2019s housing authorities even though his office also represents the authorities in a civil capacity.<\/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":[142,152,107],"class_list":["post-25632","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","category-uncategorized","tag-crime","tag-housing-authority-scandal","tag-roundhouse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25632","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=25632"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25632\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25632"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25632"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25632"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}