Candidate served jail time, had 7 arrests
County commission hopeful says events were in ‘young past’
SANTA FE — Rudy Garcia, a Santa Fe school board member who is running for a County Commission seat, was arrested seven times over a 10-year period through 2008, including four times on DWI charges, court and jail records show.
Two of the DWI counts were dismissed. Garcia, 47, was convicted in the other two drunken-driving cases. Records from the Albuquerque Metropolitan Detention Center in Albuquerque show he served more than two weeks in jail for the second DWI conviction in 2008, according to a Bernalillo County spokeswoman.
He was also arrested for “open container” — having an open bottle or can of an alcoholic beverage in a vehicle on the roadway — and for assault against a household member. He was booked into the Santa Fe County jail on those charges, in 2003 and 2005 respectively, but the outcome of the cases couldn’t be determined from available records.
Garcia, who was appointed to a vacant school board seat in December, emphasized that the incidents are in the past.
“Those are things that happened in my young past,” said Garcia, a longtime Santa Fe County employee who currently serves as the county’s legislative liaison. “I’m moving forward (and) getting over those things that happened in the past.”
In the November general election, Garcia is the Democratic nominee for the Santa Fe County Commission seat from District 3, covering much of the southern part of the county. He faces former commissioner Mike Anaya of Galisteo, who is running this time as an independent.
First asked on Monday if he’d served jail time, Garcia said, “I don’t remember if I did or didn’t.”
On Tuesday, an MDC spokesman confirmed that Garcia was behind bars at the Albuquerque jail for 16 days, from May 2-18 in 2008, when Garcia was age 37. The sentence was imposed after his second DWI conviction.
Asked Tuesday how he could not remember spending that amount of time in jail, Garcia said, “I don’t even remember what I did yesterday.” He added that he doesn’t recall ever spending that much time in jail.
The 2005 charge for assault on a household member shows up in Santa Fe County jail records. But the case can’t be found in court records. A Santa Fe Police Department report does document the incident that led to his arrest. It says Garcia was accused of attempting to kick open the back door of a woman’s residence after she didn’t answer the front door. The reporting officer described him at the time as “visibly intoxicated” and smelling of alcohol. The woman said she was afraid because Garcia had “violent tendencies.”
School board president Steven Carrillo said Tuesday that he felt he could speak for all the board members in saying that they were not aware of the charges in Garcia’s past. “This is the first time I’m hearing about this,” he said, adding that he didn’t want to say much more without knowing the facts. “I think it would be prudent to give him the benefit of the doubt.”