Evidence considered in case of former top tax official
Judge will decide whether Padilla should face trial on embezzling, other charges
Harold Dominguez, who owns a trucking company southwest of the town of Bernalillo, said he and his whole family were very upset when they learned that their certified public accountant — former state tax chief Demesia Padilla — had transferred more than $25,000 from their company’s account into her personal credit card account.
And it wasn’t just about the money, the 73-year-old testified Monday as a judge began considering whether one of Gov. Susana Martinez’s longest-serving Cabinet secretaries should stand trial on corruption charges.
“We treated her like family,” Dominguez said, describing how Padilla often stopped by his house with paperwork on Sundays. “We never thought she’d do that to us. … She’d come by the house and we’d feed her.”
The preliminary hearing in Santa Fe County Magistrate Court is expected to last more than a week. Magistrate Judge Donna Bevacqua-Young will have to decide whether the New Mexico Attorney General’s Office has presented sufficient evidence to make the state’s former top taxation official stand trial in state District Court.
Padilla faces three felony counts and five misdemeanors, all of which revolve around her work for Harold’s Grading and Trucking starting in 2011, which was her first year heading the state Department of Taxation and Revenue. Besides being charged with embezzling that money, Padilla is accused of interfering with a state audit of the trucking company in 2015 — two years after the busi-
ness fired her.
Padilla resigned her Cabinet position more than a year ago after the state Attorney General’s Office informed the governor’s office of the allegations the agency was investigating.
The former secretary, according to an affidavit from an investigator for the attorney general, said last year that Dominguez’s company owed her the money for work she had done before she became secretary.
But Dominguez and his wife Patricia Dominguez testified Monday that they never authorized the payments and that Padilla continued to work for them until they fired her in February 2013 after discovering some of the transfers.
He described a confrontation with Padilla in his office after that discovery. “She seemed nervous,” Harold Dominguez said.
Padilla’s lawyer, Paul Kennedy of Albuquerque, asked if it was true that his son, Jonathan Dominguez — who handles the business’ finances — had yelled at Padilla during that meeting.
“We were all yelling,” Harold Dominguez replied. “Everyone was upset.”
He testified that nobody at the company had ever given Padilla the authority to transfer money from their bank account. He said he once had given Padilla permission to sign paychecks for employees at a time when his wife, who normally signed the checks, was in the hospital.
Prosecutor Zach Jones showed Patricia Dominguez a copy of an online banking application which someone had signed “Patricia Dominguez.”
“That doesn’t look like my signature,” she said. Patricia Dominguez said she doesn’t know who signed the document.
The entire morning and part of the afternoon on Monday involved testimony from various records custodians and bank officials describing each transaction and bank statement during the time that Padilla was transferring money out of the company’s account. This was necessary because Kennedy refused to stipulate to the relevancy of the documents.
Ken Grier of JP Morgan Chase testified that between December 2011 and January 2013 there were 42 transactions involving money from Harold’s Grading and Trucking’s account to Padilla’s Chase card account.
Felony charges against Padilla include embezzlement, engaging in an official act for personal gain and computer access with intent to defraud or embezzle.
The misdemeanor charges involve alleged violations of state ethics laws, including failing to disclose a potential conflict of interest between her duties as tax secretary and her private accounting business.
If convicted of all charges, Padilla technically could face nearly 25 years in prison, though in recent cases of state officials convicted on corruption charges the defendants — including former Secretary of State Dianna Duran and former state Sen. Phil Griego — received sentences far short of the maximum possible penalty.
The hearing is scheduled to resume at 8:30 a.m. Tuesday with Patricia Dominguez resuming her testimony.