{"id":30506,"date":"2011-07-06T06:27:10","date_gmt":"2011-07-06T12:27:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=30506"},"modified":"2011-10-20T10:10:42","modified_gmt":"2011-10-20T16:10:42","slug":"murphy-seeks-dismissal-of-charges","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2011\/07\/murphy-seeks-dismissal-of-charges\/","title":{"rendered":"Murphy seeks dismissal of charges"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Third Judicial District Judge Mike Murphy<\/p><\/div>\n

The lawyer representing Third Judicial District Judge Mike Murphy has filed several motions seeking the dismissal of bribery charges against his client.<\/p>\n

The motions challenge the grand jury indictment of Murphy based on a number of procedural issues, alleging that the grand jury was given improper instructions, that prosecutors failed to present evidence that would have helped Murphy, that prosecutors presented irrelevant evidence, and that the target notice notifying Murphy that he might be indicted failed to properly notify him of the charges he was potentially facing.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe prosecution of Judge Murphy should end soon,\u201d said Murphy\u2019s attorney, Michael Stout. \u201cJudge Murphy has done nothing wrong, and absent a flawed procedure there would be no prosecution.\u201d<\/p>\n

He hinted that additional motions to dismiss might be coming.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis first set of motions simply points out some of many procedural flaws, but\u00a0regardless of the legal jargon, the fact remains that Judge Murphy is factually innocent,\u201d Stout said. \u201cHe should return to\u00a0the bench sooner than later.\u201d<\/p>\n

Murphy has been suspended<\/a> by the N.M. Supreme Court pending the outcome of the case.<\/p>\n

Ninth Judicial District Attorney Matt Chandler<\/a>, the special prosecutor on the case, said he\u2019s confident the charges will stand.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe presented all of the relevant facts to the grand jury, including the recording of the defendant discussing the bribes, and at the end of the day, 12 independent citizens of Do\u00f1a Ana County found probable cause that Judge Murphy broke several of New Mexico\u2019s bribery laws,\u201d Chandler said.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow the criminal defense team is going to do all they can to attack the findings of the grand jurors,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s just one of the first moves of many from the defense to try and keep this from moving forward.\u00a0We will file our responses in due time and we are confident the grand jury indictment will stand up in court.\u201d<\/p>\n

Murphy is facing\u00a0felony bribery charges<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0a misdemeanor charge<\/a>\u00a0of violating the state\u2019s Governmental Conduct Act.<\/p>\n

Prosecutors\u00a0allege that Murphy solicited a bribe<\/a> from potential judicial applicant Beverly Singleman, told District Judge Lisa Schultz to tell Singleman she needed to pay the bribe, and threatened to destroy Singleman\u2019s reputation for telling others that he solicited a bribe from her.
\n<\/p>\n

Murphy has\u00a0pleaded not guilty<\/a>. His trial is\u00a0scheduled for November<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Evidence Stout says was excluded<\/h3>\n

A memo filed in support of the dismissal motions states that Murphy claims that any advice he offered Singleman, directly at a lunch on Sept. 13, 2007 and later through District Judge Lisa Schultz, \u201cwas standard political advice, not intended to elicit a bribe\u201d and is \u201cprotected by the First Amendment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Prosecutors have made portions of a journal Schultz kept about the situation public, and those notes indicate that Schultz feared Murphy was part of a larger criminal conspiracy that went all the way to Richardson and involved other judges. But among the evidence Stout alleges Chandler failed to present to the grand jury, one of the motions to dismiss states, is \u201cJudge Schultz\u2019s testimony that she thought what Judge Murphy was saying might be untrue because he has a penchant for saying outrageous things.\u201d<\/p>\n

Also of note in the filings is Stout\u2019s claim that Chandler failed to show the grand jury \u201cJudge Murphy\u2019s bank records showing innocent transactions and showing no payment for $4,000 for his appointment.\u201d That\u2019s the amount former District Judge Stephen Bridgforth says Murphy told him he paid for his appointment.<\/p>\n

\u201cOmission of this critical and exculpatory piece of evidence is especially egregious because the foreman of the grand jury asked to be provided with such information and was put off by the prosecutor,\u201d the motion states.<\/p>\n

You can read the motions seeking dismissal of the charges against Murphy here<\/a>, here<\/a>, here<\/a> and here<\/a>, and the memo in support of the motions here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A prior version of this article incorrectly stated that Murphy is charged with paying a bribe for his position.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The lawyer representing Third Judicial District Judge Mike Murphy has filed several motions seeking the dismissal of bribery charges against his client.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[112,142,115,216,161,114,107],"class_list":["post-30506","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-bill-richardson","tag-crime","tag-dona-ana-county","tag-judge-murphy","tag-judiciary","tag-public-corruption","tag-roundhouse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30506","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=30506"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30506\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30506"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30506"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30506"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}