Police & Prison
Prison Rat
LaDonna Evans was serving a nine-year sentence for a drug conviction at the Northwestern New Mexico Correctional Facility when moving day came. State prison officials took the 42-year-old Tucumcari resident and a handful of others from what was the women’s prison to a new, remote location several miles north on the very eastern edge of […]
New Mexico imprisons people at a higher rate than some countries
A new report shows that New Mexico imprisons people at a higher rate than most U.S. states and every other country in the world, and there is little correlation between high incarceration rates and violent crime. The Prison Policy Initiative found that New Mexico incarcerates 773 people per 100,000 total population, and if one imagines […]
Should Albuquerque’s fledgling Violence Intervention Program be the model for New Mexico?
A year and a half after the launch of Albuquerque’s Violence Intervention Program, questions linger about whether it is reducing shootings in the city and should serve as a model for similar programs in other parts of New Mexico. Albuquerque’s program, started in March 2020, identifies people who are at the highest risk of being […]
Officials unveil their agenda to fight crime in Albuquerque
Albuquerque police leadership and New Mexico lawmakers released a slate of proposed reforms they believe will reduce violent crime in the city and around the state. But local organizers say the proposals represent a series of steps backward. Officials with the Albuquerque Metro Crime Initiative released on Sept. 21 a “crime-fighting agenda” of 40 separate […]
Remembering Nikki Bascom
Not long after a 17-year-old Nikki Bascom gave birth to her son, someone gave her a letter. It was about how the mothers of disabled children are chosen by God and given extraordinary skills to raise them. “That was Nikki,” said her mother Karri Dalton, who found the letter in a box at her home […]
Albuquerque police still sweeping homeless camps, despite CDC guidelines
Richard Murray and Terryn Paul both like to draw. Sitting on the grass at Wells Park near Downtown Albuquerque on Sept. 16, they read books, smoke cigarillos and sharpen colored pencils using a knife with a pearlescent handle. They’ve been living unsheltered on the city streets for five years, repeatedly missing chances to get housing. […]
Gymnasts urge U.S. Senate to investigate Larry Nassar sexual abuse after botched FBI inquiry
WASHINGTON — Olympic gold medalists including Simone Biles and Aly Raisman on Wednesday detailed for the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee the failure of the FBI to investigate dozens of complaints of sexual abuse committed by Larry Nassar, the disgraced team doctor for USA Gymnastics and a former Michigan State University physician. The gymnasts also urged senators to […]
Lawmaker: APD ‘tied their own hands’ with class-action jail settlement
A Democratic state lawmaker and former prosecutor says he sees a connection between rising violent crime and a 2017 settlement prohibiting Albuquerque police from arresting people accused of some misdemeanor crimes. In 2017, the city of Albuquerque settled with people incarcerated at the Metropolitan Detention Center who sued more than two decades earlier — in […]
Black Lives Still Matter
Every time a Black person is murdered, I am keenly aware that it could have been me, my son or any of my family members. On Aug. 30, 2019, Elijah Jovan McClain’s life was cut short at the young age of 23 after an encounter with the Aurora Police Department in Colorado. The Aurora Police […]
Feds expand Pell Grant program for prisoners working on college degrees
WASHINGTON — Prison inmates around the U.S. are getting the chance to do something that was almost unheard of a generation ago: pursue a college degree while behind bars and with financial support from the federal government. Inmates in 42 states, including New Mexico, as well as in Washington, D.C., have more access to federal […]
State officials don’t know how many Native American women are missing
When an Indigenous person needs support in a violent and dangerous situation, an ally in the community is a rare vital resource. In Nambé Pueblo, Chastity Sandoval is that person. “There is a high chance of no justice happening,” said Sandoval, the victim legal advocate in Nambé. “So how do we accommodate and accompany our […]
N.M. teachers’ retirement still tied up with prison phone company
The board that invests the pension fund for New Mexico teachers promised last year not to fund private prisons anymore. But critics say the pension fund still has millions of dollars invested in a related, exploitive industry: prison phone calls.