Panhandling law enforcement on hold
City attorney is reviewing constitutionality of law.
Prosecutors from the First Judicial District Attorney’s Office asked a state judge Wednesday to order monitoring of a man accused of murder who was released from jail four months ago.
In a brief hearing, District Judge T. Glenn Ellington granted basic supervision of Robert Mondrian-Powell, who was charged in the 2016 death of his girlfriend, former Santa Fe librarian Elvira Segura, in her Nambé home. But Ellington first pointed out that prosecutors could have made the request months earlier, before the man was let out of jail in June.
Mondrian-Powell, 59, was arrested in Las Cruces in October 2016 and then transferred to the Santa Fe County jail later that month, inmate logs show.
He was incarcerated for more than 20 months before Ellington threw out the murder charge against him earlier this year, ruling prosecutors had violated the defendant’s right to a speedy trial.
Mondrian-Powell walked out of the Santa Fe County jail on the morning of June 23, free from restraints and supervision for the first time in nearly two years. But his case isn’t over yet. State prosecutors have challenged Ellington’s ruling in the state Court of Appeals and are “confident the appeal is going to go in our favor,” prosecutor Martin Maxwell said at Wednesday’s hearing.
In the meantime, Maxwell asked Ellington to implement “some type of security to keep Mr. Mondrian-Powell in New Mexico” while they wait to see if the appeals court will allow the case to proceed.
“Our main concern is that Mondrian-Powell is a flight risk,” Maxwell said.
An affidavit for Mondrian-Powell’s arrest says he told police he had shot Segura, but instead of reporting the shooting, he took the gun and the woman’s vehicle and fled to Las Cruces.
Ellington granted the prosecutors’ request, saying he’d allow Mondrian-Powell to be placed on standard conditions of release, including stipulations that he not own a gun, not leave the state and have regular contact with attorneys.
Prosecutors could have asked for the same stipulations on the day Ellington dismissed the charges, the judge said, which was the day before Mondrian-Powell’s release.
“This all could have happened on the 22nd of June,” Ellington said.