HB 274 Sponsor Rep. Elaine Sena Cortez, R-Hobbs
By ESTEBAN CANDELARIA
The Santa Fe New Mexican
During debates on the crime package passed last month — which bundled together several tough-on-crime measures but which critics said was inadequate — lawmakers said they were just getting started.
But Thursday evening, a panel known for killing Republican-sponsored legislation shot down two bills held up by GOP lawmakers, prosecutors and Democratic Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham as ways of tackling some of the state’s greatest public safety issues.
House Bills 134 and 274, which respectively would have implemented harsher penalties for juvenile offenders and imposed life sentences on fentanyl traffickers, were each tabled on 4-2 party line votes by the House Consumer and Public Affairs Committee.
“We come to Santa Fe to come fix the crime issue — we say — and when we do that … we don’t pass bills that actually can fix crime,” said Rep. John Block, R-Alamogordo. “We pass weak sauce, sad excuses for legislation.”
Republican lawmakers made a couple of runs at including expanded penalties for juvenile offenders through floor amendments to the Legislature’s crime package proposal, House Bill 8.
Those amendments, however, were summarily voted down. And on Friday, supporters of the bills lambasted the committee’s actions, noting that with just about two weeks left in the session, they were all but dead.
“The whole process of how this panned out, and ‘Oh, we’re going to give you more — HB 8 is a start, and more is coming.’ We haven’t seen that at all,” Rep. Andrea Reeb, R-Clovis, sponsor of HB 134, said in an interview. “All they’re doing is … kicking this can down the road, and I’m frustrated. I’m angry about it.”
‘Unwilling to change the status quo’
HB 134, the measure to increase penalties for juvenile offenders, saw significant trimming before it was tabled, with bill’s sponsors proposing a substitute measure cutting it from 52 pages to just eight.
That substitute kept intact a key proposal to expand the state’s definition of a serious youthful offender — who are sentenced as adults — to include a host of new crimes in addition to first-degree murder, including second-degree murder and voluntary manslaughter, but removed a provision that would have seen young people locked up in juvenile detention centers transferred to adult jails on their 18th birthdays.
Second Judicial District Attorney Sam Bregman, who says his office has seen an explosion of violent juvenile crime in recent years and has been pushing for a crackdown, said the substitute was something of a compromise to lawmakers who had previously expressed concerns about the original bill.
“There was an effort to get something done, at least,” Bregman, the district attorney for Bernalillo County, said in an interview.
Bregman said tabling the bill made it clear lawmakers were “unwilling to change the status quo.”
“Tabling this bill — and basically not doing anything to address juvenile crime in the Legislature — I think sends a clear message that a lot of legislators don’t feel the same way that I do, working in the trenches every day, in how big a problem it is,” he said.
Lujan Grisham said in a statement Friday she was “disappointed HB 134 didn’t make it to my desk.
“But with more than two weeks remaining in the legislative session, I remain optimistic that lawmakers will address juvenile justice in a meaningful way,” she added. “New Mexicans are demanding juvenile justice reform, and I urge lawmakers to answer their call.”
During Thursday’s meeting, Democratic lawmakers expressed concerns the bill focused too much on incarceration and not enough on rehabilitation of young people.
“We’re now choosing to incarcerate them longer, rather than look at a situation where we could actually work with these individuals and rehabilitate them at a younger age,” said Rep. Andrea Romero, D-Santa Fe.
Life sentences for fentanyl trafficking deemed too harsh
Opponents of HB 274 argued the proposal to impose life sentences on fentanyl traffickers was too harsh and that HB 8, which the governor signed into law last month, already addressed penalties for fentanyl trafficking.
That bill implements optional penalties judges can impose for serious fentanyl traffickers. Under HB 8, if someone is caught with 100 to 500 pills, or 10 to 50 grams of fentanyl powder, they can receive up to an additional three years in prison. If they’re caught with 500 pills or more — or 50 grams or more — they can get an extra five years. If they’re found to have been directing, recruiting and/or overseeing others trafficking fentanyl, an offender can also get an additional five years in prison.
However, Rep. Elaine Sena Cortez, R-Hobbs and the sponsor of HB 274, said in an interview the crime package did not do enough to tackle the state’s fentanyl problem and that the threat of life in prison would have proven a significant deterrent for would-be traffickers.
“If we want to show that New Mexico is closed for business, the only way that we can do that is to put a stop to it by actually holding them accountable,” she said.
Some lawmakers expressed concerns HB 274 did not leave enough discretion to judges or distinguish between low-level fentanyl traffickers and more prolific ones by tying sentencing to the amount a person is caught with.
“This is like a one-size-fits-all, that someone having a first offense — and maybe for just sharing with their friend who also uses fentanyl — would have these severe consequences,” said committee chair Rep. Joanne Ferrary, D-Las Cruces.
Editor’s note: Esteban Candelaria is a corps member with Report for America, a national service program that places journalists into local newsrooms. He covers child welfare and the state Children, Youth and Families Department. Learn more about Report for America at reportforamerica.org.