Richard C. Bosson

This case involved a wrongful death suit by the estate of Katherine Paquin against the New Mexico Corrections Department and officials, alleging that the Department negligently released inmate Christopher Blattner three years early due to record-keeping errors, after which Blattner murdered Paquin off-premises. The district court granted summary judgment to the Department, finding the Tort Claims Act's building waiver under NMSA 1978, § 41-4-6(A) inapplicable to off-premises injuries or administrative functions. The Court of Appeals reversed, and the New Mexico Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the building waiver contains no geographical limitation and that negligent prisoner release, if sufficiently pleaded, can constitute negligent operation of a public facility. The Court disavowed prior precedent categorically excluding administrative functions from the waiver while preserving the requirement that the danger affect the general public or a class of persons rather than a single individual.

criminal lawtorts & liability

This case concerned the constitutionality of New Mexico legislation (Senate Bill 266) that staggered the retention election cycles for district and metropolitan court judges. Petitioners, sitting judges and their association, sought a writ of mandamus arguing that Article VI, Section 33 of the state constitution required all such judges to stand for retention at the same time and that this more specific provision controlled over a 2020 amendment to Article XX, Section 3. The Supreme Court denied the petition, holding that the voters' approval of the Article XX amendment expressly authorized the Legislature to stagger elections for particular state, county, or district offices, thereby permitting the staggered judicial retention schedules in Sections 1-26-5 and -6. The Court reasoned that the amendment implicitly repealed any contrary uniformity requirement in Article VI and that the legislation was therefore constitutional.

elections

The case involved Rudy Sais, a correctional officer employed by the New Mexico Department of Corrections, who was terminated after his second arrest for driving while intoxicated under the department's DWI Policy, which required self-reporting of arrests and imposed minimum sanctions including dismissal for a second offense. Sais appealed to the State Personnel Board, arguing that the department had treated him differently from at least three other employees with multiple DWI arrests who remained employed. The administrative law judge and district court sided with Sais on grounds of arbitrary and capricious action, but the New Mexico Supreme Court reversed, upholding the Personnel Board's decision to affirm the termination. The court reasoned that, unlike in its prior Kibbe decision, the department had introduced substantial evidence in the record to explain the differing treatment of the other employees, including that some arrests predated the policy, lacked documentation, or did not involve self-reporting that would trigger investigation.

labor & employmentcriminal law

The case concerned a DWI conviction obtained in Bernalillo County Metropolitan Court, where an unlicensed individual participated in the prosecution alongside a licensed assistant district attorney. The defendant sought a new trial, arguing that the unauthorized practice of law required reversal. The district court and Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction, relying on a statute that appeared to permit non-attorneys to practice in magistrate courts, of which metropolitan court is a type. The New Mexico Supreme Court affirmed the conviction, reasoning that judicial authority to regulate the practice of law is exclusive and that the licensed prosecutor conducted the case without prejudice from the unauthorized participation.

criminal lawprocedure

In State v. Trujillo, the New Mexico Supreme Court reviewed a district court's suppression of evidence obtained via a search warrant in a criminal case involving allegations that the defendant molested his teenage niece and cousin, including descriptions of sexual acts, pornographic materials, and letters. The Court of Appeals had upheld the suppression on grounds that the supporting affidavit failed to establish a sufficient nexus between the alleged crimes and the specific residence to be searched. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that reviewing courts must defer to the issuing judge's probable cause determination if the affidavit provides a substantial basis for it, and remanded for further proceedings. The core reasoning centered on avoiding substitution of the reviewing court's judgment for that of the warrant-issuing judge when reasonable inferences support the warrant.

criminal lawprocedure

In State v. Cruz, the defendant, owner of a construction company, was convicted under New Mexico's Worthless Check Act for issuing four payroll checks that were returned for insufficient funds after workers cashed them at a trading post. The Court of Appeals reversed the convictions, concluding that the Act requires a contemporaneous exchange of value and does not cover checks issued for pre-existing or antecedent debts, such as wages from a prior pay period. The New Mexico Supreme Court reversed that decision, holding that the Act's prohibition on issuing worthless checks "in exchange for anything of value" applies to payroll checks delivered after a typical processing delay. The Court based its ruling on the plain language of the modern statute, its legislative history and purpose, and the rejection of older case law interpretations that imposed a contemporaneous transaction requirement.

criminal lawbusiness & regulatoryproperty

This case concerned a medical malpractice claim by Cynthia and Perfecto Provencio against Dr. Steven Wenrich for wrongful conception after a failed tubal ligation performed during a cesarean section, seeking only the future costs of raising the resulting child to adulthood. The New Mexico Supreme Court affirmed the district court's dismissal of the claim and reversed the Court of Appeals, holding that damages for child-rearing expenses in such cases are available only when a doctor breaches the duty to inform the patient of the failed sterilization and continued fertility. The core reasoning was that the precedent in Lovelace Medical Center v. Mendez requires an informational injury from lack of notice as an essential element, and here the patient was promptly informed and understood she remained fertile, breaking any causal chain for those specific damages.

torts & liabilityhealthcare

The case involved defendant Ronald Myers' convictions under New Mexico's Sexual Exploitation of Children Act for secretly videotaping two female minors in a bathroom in a government office. After an earlier Supreme Court decision upheld the convictions by interpreting the Act to cover the videotapes as depicting prohibited sexual acts and as obscene, the Court of Appeals on remand held that this interpretation could not be applied retroactively without violating due process. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that the prior interpretation was foreseeable and did not operate like an ex post facto law, and further ruled that district courts lack authority to stay the mandatory sex offender registration requirements of SORNA pending appeal because registration is a collateral consequence imposed by statute rather than court discretion.

criminal lawprocedure

In this case, the defendant was convicted of first-degree murder, aggravated arson, kidnapping (later vacated), and three separate conspiracy counts arising from an assault and killing at a residence in Taos. The New Mexico Supreme Court affirmed the convictions for murder, aggravated arson, and conspiracy to commit murder, finding sufficient evidence to support them, but reversed two of the conspiracy convictions. The court held that the multiple conspiracy convictions violated double jeopardy principles and, for the first time, applied its unit-of-prosecution analysis to such claims, clarifying that only one conspiracy conviction could stand based on the single agreement among the participants. The court also briefly rejected the defendant's other claims regarding continuances, improbable testimony, and newly discovered evidence.

criminal lawprocedure

This case concerned the revocation of defendant Jaime Guthrie's probation for failing to complete a required residential treatment program and other conditions. The district court revoked probation after hearing testimony from the probation officer's supervisor, who relied on hearsay from the probation file, and noting that Guthrie's arrest in a county without such a program made completion impossible. The Court of Appeals reversed on due process grounds, holding that the district court failed to address the absent probation officer's unavailability or the reliability of the hearsay evidence under the standard set in State v. Phillips. The New Mexico Supreme Court overruled Phillips, shifting the focus to whether live confrontation was essential to the truth-finding process in probation revocation hearings, and reinstated the revocation because the record, including the judge's independent observation, reliably supported the violation finding.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved whether the dismissal of criminal charges against Eliseo Santos Martinez under New Mexico's six-month rule for timely prosecution remained valid after the Supreme Court issued State v. Savedra, which withdrew that rule and directed use of constitutional speedy trial analysis instead. The district court had dismissed the charges for aggravated burglary, aggravated battery, and conspiracy due to the rule violation, and the Court of Appeals affirmed. The Supreme Court held that Savedra applies to all cases not yet final as of May 12, 2010, including those on appeal, because the intent was to immediately replace the technical rule with speedy trial factors in pending matters. Therefore, the Court reversed and remanded for reinstatement of the charges, permitting the defendant to raise any speedy trial claim.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved a petition by the New Mexico Attorney General for a writ of mandamus directing the Commissioner of Public Lands to cancel four proposed exchanges of state trust lands in areas such as White Peak for privately owned lands. The Supreme Court of New Mexico granted the writ, holding that the exchanges were not authorized under the New Mexico Enabling Act of 1910 or the state constitution, which incorporated the Act's restrictions on the management and disposition of trust lands granted by Congress. The core reasoning was that the Enabling Act imposes strict conditions on the handling of these lands for the benefit of public institutions, and the exchanges did not comply with those requirements; the Court rejected arguments that prior practices or constitutional amendments had altered this framework. The decision was limited to the legality of the exchanges and did not address their policy merits.

propertyfederal powerprocedure

In State v. Wilson, the defendant was convicted of first-degree child abuse resulting in the death of his two-year-old foster child after he admitted to suffocating the child with a blanket. The New Mexico Supreme Court affirmed the conviction on direct appeal. The court held that the corpus delicti was sufficiently established by evidence independent of the confession, the trial court did not abuse its discretion in admitting expert testimony from a forensic pathologist regarding the cause of death, the defendant's confession was voluntary and admissible without violating the Fifth or Fourteenth Amendments, and there was no cumulative error.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved an attorney who sued her former client, an insurance company, claiming breach of an agreement to defend and indemnify her against claims brought by the company's insureds in related litigation. A jury found the company liable and awarded the attorney compensatory damages that included substantial future legal fees she claimed would have been earned absent the breach. The New Mexico Supreme Court affirmed the jury's liability determination on the breach of contract claim but reversed the award of unearned future attorney fees, concluding that such recovery would violate public policy by undermining the client's ability to terminate the attorney-client relationship at will. The court further held that the defense and indemnification promise qualified as an insurance contract under state statute and remanded for additional proceedings.

business & regulatoryprocedure

The case concerned whether New Mexico’s statute allowing a judge, rather than a jury, to decide at an evidentiary hearing whether a juvenile youthful offender is amenable to treatment in the juvenile system or should receive an adult prison sentence violates the Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial. The defendant, a seventeen-year-old charged with multiple counts of shooting from a motor vehicle and aggravated battery after a gang-related incident, entered a plea agreement that left the sentencing decision to the amenability determination under NMSA 1978, § 32A-2-20. The Supreme Court of New Mexico held that the statute is constitutional and that the judge may make the amenability findings. Relying on the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Oregon v. Ice, the Court concluded that the Sixth Amendment does not require jury findings on facts that affect the choice between juvenile and adult sentencing schemes. The Court reversed the contrary decision of the Court of Appeals and remanded the case.

criminal lawprocedure

In this criminal case, the State sought to introduce statements made by a nine-year-old alleged victim of sexual abuse to a Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner (SANE) nurse during an examination, which the trial court suppressed under prior precedent. The New Mexico Supreme Court held that the prior case of State v. Ortega had overly restricted the hearsay exception for statements made for medical diagnosis or treatment under Rule 11-803(D) by categorically limiting their use when made to SANE nurses. The Court reversed the evidentiary ruling and the Court of Appeals decision, partially overruled Ortega, and remanded for the trial court to determine admissibility based on the trustworthiness of the specific statements, while also considering prejudice under Rule 11-403. The decision emphasizes evaluating each statement's context rather than applying a blanket exclusion.

criminal lawprocedure

The case concerned whether New Mexico’s tampering with evidence statute applies when a probationer attempts to substitute a false urine sample for a required drug test, which constitutes a probation violation but not a separate underlying crime. Defendant Clarence Jackson was indicted under the statute after the sample bottle fell from his clothing and he admitted the deception; he moved to dismiss, arguing the law requires interference with investigation of an independent crime. The district court denied the motion, leading to a conditional guilty plea, but the Court of Appeals reversed the conviction. On certiorari, the New Mexico Supreme Court reinstated the conviction, holding that the statute’s plain language and its specific punishment category for “indeterminate” crimes allow conviction whenever a person tampers with evidence intending to prevent apprehension, prosecution, or conviction, regardless of whether a separate crime is involved.

criminal law

The case involved a defendant convicted by general verdict of driving while intoxicated under New Mexico law, based on alternative theories of either actually driving while impaired or being in actual physical control of a vehicle while impaired. The defendant was found in a parked, inoperable Jeep after admitting he had driven there and consumed alcohol, but the vehicle had a dead battery and could not start. Relying on the recent Sims decision, the Supreme Court held that actual physical control does not apply as a matter of law when a vehicle is inoperable, because the statute requires evidence of intent to drive, and the general verdict created due process concerns by not specifying the basis for conviction. The Court reversed the conviction to the extent it rested on actual physical control and remanded for a new trial limited to whether the defendant actually drove while intoxicated, using factors like his admissions and the vehicle's location.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved Jackie Akins, an African-American union member employed by the City of Carlsbad, who sued his union for breaching its common-law duty of fair representation by refusing to file a grievance over racial discrimination and a hostile work environment in his workplace. The New Mexico Supreme Court held that punitive damages are available in duty of fair representation suits under state common law when the union’s conduct is malicious, willful, reckless, wanton, fraudulent, or in bad faith. The court declined to adopt a per se exclusion of punitive damages similar to that applied by the U.S. Supreme Court in cases involving federally regulated unions. Instead, it reasoned that New Mexico’s common-law tradition permits punitive damages in tort-like claims to punish outrageous conduct and deter similar future actions, consistent with prior state precedent on the duty of fair representation.

labor & employmentcivil rights

The case involved defendant Jose Garcia, who pleaded guilty to intentional child abuse resulting in the death of a child under 12 years old, a crime carrying a life sentence. Garcia sought to withdraw his plea, arguing that his trial counsel provided ineffective assistance by incorrectly advising him that both intentional and negligent child abuse resulting in death were first-degree felonies punishable by 30 years and that conviction was possible even for an accident. After examining the 2005 statutory amendments distinguishing intentional from negligent abuse and the applicable sentencing rules, the New Mexico Supreme Court held that counsel's performance was deficient and prejudiced the defendant. The court reversed the trial court's denial of the motion and remanded to permit withdrawal of the guilty plea.

criminal lawprocedure