{"id":26343,"date":"2011-02-21T11:01:07","date_gmt":"2011-02-21T18:01:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=26343"},"modified":"2011-02-21T11:02:00","modified_gmt":"2011-02-21T18:02:00","slug":"housing-authority-defendants-ask-high-court-to-remove-ag","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2011\/02\/housing-authority-defendants-ask-high-court-to-remove-ag\/","title":{"rendered":"Housing authority defendants ask high court to remove AG"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Attorney General Gary King (Photo by Heath Haussamen)<\/p><\/div>\n

The defendants in a case\u00a0involving the state\u2019s housing authorities<\/a> have asked the N.M. Supreme Court to remove Attorney General Gary King<\/a> and his office from the case.<\/p>\n

The appeal to the state\u2019s high court comes after the Court of Appeals ruled that King can prosecute the case<\/a> even though his office also represents, in a civil capacity, the housing authorities and the State Investment Council (SIC) \u2013 whose bonding on behalf of the housing authorities is at the center of the case.<\/p>\n

That dual role creates, as the very least, a negative appearance, the defendants argue in a Feb. 14 filing<\/a> with the Supreme Court.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt a minimum, the AGO acting as prosecutor and counsel for the interested parties such as the alleged victim SIC and several witnesses creates impermissible opportunities for conflicts to arise, and thus creates the appearance of impropriety,\u201d the filing states.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe longer this prosecution continues, particularly with the AGO at the helm, the more damage is done to the system\u2019s integrity,\u201d it states.<\/p>\n

Former Region III Housing Authority Director Vincent \u201cSmiley\u201d Gallegos, former Region III accountant Dennis M. Kennedy, and former Region III bond attorney Robert Strumor 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.<\/p>\n

A \u2018Chinese wall\u2019<\/h3>\n

Defendants in the housing authority case and another high-profile case\u00a0against former Secretary of State Rebecca Vigil-Giron<\/a> allege that 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

King defends his office by saying that a\u00a0\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

A recent job posting from the AG\u2019s office seeking a new government accountability division director \u2013 the employee responsible for investigating public corruption cases \u2013 states that the director \u201creports directly to the attorney general with oversight by the chief deputy attorney general.\u201d<\/p>\n

AG spokesman Phil Sisneros said Lama is the director\u2019s \u201cimmediate supervisor,\u201d even though all division directors \u201chave some responsibility to report to the attorney general since he is the chief executive of the office.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis system has no effect upon our efforts to ensure that no conflicts occur between civil and criminal investigations,\u201d Sisneros said. \u201c\u2026 The AG supervises all division directors in the sense that we all take his direction on policy and other matters. But again, on a day-to-day basis, the chief deputy serves as our immediate supervisor.\u201d<\/p>\n

Time to ‘draw the line’<\/h3>\n

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

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":"

The defendants in a case involving the state\u2019s housing authorities have asked the N.M. Supreme Court to remove AG Gary King and his office from the case.<\/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-26343","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\/26343","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=26343"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26343\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}