Supreme Court overturns dismissals
Indictments were tied to armed robbery in Taos in 2013
SANTA FE — The New Mexico Supreme Court on Monday overturned a trial judge’s dismissal of indictments in an armed robbery in Taos that netted more than $110,000 in cash and more than $116,000 in checks — despite that fact that faulty subpoenas were used to obtain evidence in the case.
The high court held the Legislature has not given state courts the authority to dismiss otherwise valid indictments because a grand jury considered evidence that would be inadmissible at trial.
Former District Court Judge John Paternoster had quashed grand jury indictments against Isaac Martinez and Carla Casias for the robbery of Kit Carson Electric Cooperative in 2013. He ruled that evidence presented to the jury had been discovered through the use of improperly issued subpoenas for cell phone records.
Believing it was an inside job, a Taos police detective and a deputy prosecutor issued the subpoenas for the phone records of several people they believed were involved in the robbery. Police believe Casias, who worked in the co-op’s billing office, played a role in the heist. A gunman took the money and checks from an employee on the co-op’s parking lot.
The Supreme Court previously ruled that the subpoenas, issued without a judge’s or a grand jury’s approval and which weren’t part of any existing criminal court case, were an abuse of government power.
That decision from last year was on temporary reprimands for Taos District Attorney Donald Gallegos and former prosecutor Emilio Chavez, now a district court judge, over their use of the subpoenas, an administrative matter separate from the robbery’s criminal case proceedings.
In Monday’s unanimous ruling, the Supreme Court again stated that the subpoenas “issued unilaterally by the deputy district attorney in the absence of any pending court or grand jury proceeding were unlawful.”
But the high court cited the independence of grand jury proceedings — under which prosecutors present evidence to a jury in closed proceedings — and held that New Mexico statutes and judicial precedents confirm that Judge Paternoster “lacked authority to review the admissibility of evidence considered by the grand jury.”
State law permits a court review of evidence supporting a grand jury indictment only if there is a showing of bad faith by the prosecutor assisting the grand jury, the Supreme Court held.
The Supreme Court “has consistently honored a strong policy of resisting dismissal of otherwise valid grand jury indictments based on disputes about the source or trial admissibility of the evidence considered by the grand jury,” said the opinion written by Supreme Court Justice Charles Daniels.
Still, once a criminal case goes to trial, a court can bar the use of improperly obtained evidence — which in this case would seem to be a foregone conclusion, given that the Supreme Court has already determined that the subpoenas for cell phone records were unlawful. The robbery case was ordered back to the state District Court in Taos for further proceedings.