Justia Constitutional Law Opinion Summaries

Defendant Anthony Blas Yepez was convicted of, among other crimes, second-degree murder. At issue before the New Mexico Supreme Court was the district court’s exclusion of proposed expert testimony concerning Yepez’s alleged genetic predisposition to impulsive violence: testimony Yepez offered on the issue of whether he had the deliberate intent to kill. The Supreme Court held that the district court did not abuse its discretion by excluding the testimony. Accordingly, the Court reversed the Court of Appeals’ holding on this issue, rejected Yepez’s cross-appeal, and affirmed his conviction. View "New Mexico v. Yepez" on Justia Law

Defendant Lorenzo Martinez appealed his convictions for first- degree murder and third-degree criminal sexual penetration (CSP) of the victim (Victim) after she died. Defendant challenged his convictions on multiple grounds, most of which were controlled by precedent. However, the New Mexico Supreme Court reviewed one argument as a matter of first impression: whether a decedent constituted a “person” as that term was defined and used in NMSA Section 30-9-11(A). Based on the following reasoning, the Supreme Court determined that Victim constituted a person under the unique circumstances of CSP in this case, and therefore affirmed Defendant’s convictions. View "New Mexico v. Martinez" on Justia Law

As part of a project to construct a new road along the North Diversion Channel, the City of Albuquerque initiated a condemnation proceeding to acquire a thirty-foot-wide strip of land across a 9.859-acre property (Property) owned by SMP Properties, LLC, whose managing member was R. Michael Pack (collectively, SMP). The district court granted Albuquerque entry and ordered the distribution of $143,850 to SMP as “just compensation” for the condemned property. SMP asserted it did not receive full compensation because, prior to initiating the condemnation action, Albuquerque directly communicated its intent to condemn a portion of the Property to one of SMP’s tenants, SAIA Motor Freight Line, LLC (SAIA). Hearing of Albuquerque’s intent to condemn, SAIA apparently decided not to renew its lease before Albuquerque filed the contemplated condemnation action, determining that the condemnation would disrupt its operation and use of the portion of the Property it leased. Based on Albuquerque’s pre-condemnation communications with SAIA and SAIA’s subsequent failure to renew its lease, SMP asserted an inverse condemnation claim against Albuquerque seeking consequential damages, including lost rental income and devaluation of the Property adjacent to the thirty-foot wide strip that Albuquerque condemned. Albuquerque moved for partial summary judgment on SMP’s “claims for consequential damages relating to the loss of potential tenant leases.” The district court granted Albuquerque summary judgment and concluded that Albuquerque’s pre-condemnation activity did not constitute “substantial[] interfere[nce] with the landowner’s use and enjoyment of the [P]roperty,” and therefore, no taking (in the form of an inverse condemnation) occurred. The Court of Appeals reversed the district court, finding there were disputed issues of material fact to preclude summary judgment. Though it did not adopt the appellate court’s reasoning, the New Mexico Supreme Court affirmed reversal of summary judgment. View "City of Albuquerque v. SMP Props., LLC" on Justia Law

The Harding County, New Mexico Board of County Commissioners, the Mosquero Municipal Schools Board of Education, and the Roy Municipal Schools Board of Education (collectively, Petitioners) petitioned for a writ of mandamus to compel the New Mexico Taxation and Revenue Department and the department’s Secretary Stephanie Schardin Clarke (collectively, the Department) to establish values for two high-voltage transmission lines in Harding County and report those values to the Harding County Assessor (Assessor) so that property taxes could be assessed on the lines. A district court issued the writ, and a dispute arose over whether the Department complied as ordered. Petitioners moved for an order to show cause, and requested fees associated with petitioning for the writ. After full briefing and a hearing, the district court held the Department in contempt for failing to comply with the district court’s order and awarded Petitioners their costs and fees related to the order to show cause. The Department appealed and sought review of the Peremptory Writ, the contempt holding, and the award of costs and fees. The Court of Appeals declined to review the merits of the Peremptory Writ, concluding that the Department failed to timely appeal that final order. However, the Court of Appeals reviewed the “issues relating to the Contempt Order and the Order for Fees and Costs” and affirmed the district court. The Department petitioned the New Mexico Supreme Court for certiorari review pursuant to Rule 12-502 NMRA. The Court granted certiorari, and finding no reversible error, affirmed the Court of Appeals. View "Harding Cnty. Bd. of Comm'rs v. N.M. Tax'n & Revenue Dep't" on Justia Law

Anastacia Morper sought preprimary designation as a candidate for the office of United States Representative from New Mexico’s Third Congressional District at the 2020 Republican Party Pre-Primary Convention. The Secretary of State invalidated forty-four of Morper’s nominating petitions because those petitions omitted the heading “2020 PRIMARY NOMINATING PETITION,” which the Secretary deemed to be critical information required by law. By extension, the Secretary invalidated the signatures on those forty-four nominating petitions. In doing so, the Secretary invalidated over seven hundred signatures, leaving only forty-three signatures on the five nominating petitions the Secretary did not invalidate. The Secretary informed Morper that she had not received the “minimum number of signatures required” to be “qualified as a candidate” for the preprimary convention. Morper appealed the Secretary’s decision to the district court. The district court upheld the Secretary’s decision concluding that “the Secretary of State has the right to reject . . . nominating petitions that were not on the form prescribed by law.” The Supreme Court reversed. "We appreciate that the reviewing official at the Secretary’s office may have been required to give the nominating petitions that Morper filed more than a cursory glance to ascertain that the petitions were in the form that Section 1-8-30(C) prescribes, contained the information that Section 1-1-26(A) requires, and were identical to the Secretary’s Form except for the omitted heading. However, this additional attention does not justify the Secretary’s argument that allowing her to invalidate any form that omitted the heading that she approved—regardless of whether the remainder of the form is identical to the Secretary’s Form—protects the integrity and fairness of the elective franchise." View "Morper v. Oliver" on Justia Law

Plaintiff Andrew Jones appealed the grant of summary judgment to the Department of Public Safety (DPS), dismissing Jones’s Inspection of Public Records Act (IPRA) enforcement action. Jones argued the district court misconstrued Section 14-2-1(A)(4) and incorrectly allowed DPS to withhold requested public records solely because the records related to an ongoing criminal investigation. Jones further argued the Court of Appeals was incorrect to hold that he acquiesced to the district court’s interpretation of Section 14-2-1(A)(4), was incorrect to hold that his lawsuit was moot, and wrongly dismissed his appeal. After review, the New Mexico Supreme Court concluded Jones was correct. The Court of Appeals was reversed, and the district court's grant of summary judgment to DPS was too, concluding that the district court’s interpretation of Section 14-2-1(A)(4) was overbroad and contrary to the plain language of the statute. "That misinterpretation also led the district court to incorrectly deny summary judgment to Jones at an earlier point in the case. Accordingly, we reverse that judgment as well." View "Jones v. N.M. Dep't of Public Safety" on Justia Law

The district court suppressed records that police officers obtained from Defendant Jaycob Price’s cell phone provider pursuant to a search warrant. Under the authority of the search warrant, the officers obtained: (1) subscriber information consisting of Defendant’s name, date of birth, social security number, and address; (2) cell-site location information (CSLI); and (3) a list of calls and text messages to and from Defendant’s cell phone. The district court ruled that the affidavit for the search warrant established probable cause to obtain Defendant’s subscriber information but failed to establish probable cause for the CSLI and call/text records, and ordered suppression of the CSLI and call/text records. The State appealed. The New Mexico Supreme Court held the district court correctly concluded that the Affidavit as a whole, together with reasonable inferences to be drawn therefrom, provided the issuing judge with a substantial basis for determining that there was probable cause to believe that Defendant’s subscriber information contained evidence of a crime. The Court held the district court erred in ruling that there was no probable cause to obtain Defendant’s CSLI and call/text records. The Court therefore affirmed in part and reversed in part the district court's order partially granting Defendant’s motion to suppress the cell phone records. The matter was remanded to the district court for further proceedings. View "New Mexico v. Price" on Justia Law

Cases consolidated for the New Mexico Supreme Court's review shared a common issue and an opportunity to define “uniformed law enforcement officer” and “appropriately marked law enforcement vehicle” under NMSA 1978, Section 30-22-1.1(A) (2003), which defined the crime of aggravated fleeing from a law enforcement officer. The Court granted certiorari (1) in New Mexico v. Montano, 423 P.3d 1 (2018), to review the reasoning of Montano and consider whether the law enforcement officer was “uniformed” under Section 30-22-1.1(A); and (2) in New Mexico v. Martinez, A-1-CA-35111, mem. op. (May 14, 2018) (nonprecedential), to review the Montano reasoning and consider whether the law enforcement officers in Martinez and Montano were each in an “appropriately marked law enforcement vehicle” under Section 30-22-1.1(A). The Court affirmed the Court of Appeals' determination of what constituted a “uniformed law enforcement officer” and rejected its determination of what constituted an “appropriately marked law enforcement vehicle.” Therefore, the Court concluded the officer in Montano was not a “uniformed law enforcement officer” and that neither the officer in Montano nor the officer in Martinez was in an “appropriately marked law enforcement vehicle.” View "New Mexico v. Montano" on Justia Law

Officers from the Albuquerque Police Department (APD) approached Defendant Ronald Widmer in a Walgreens parking lot in the late evening. Defendant, accompanied by a woman, was trying to start a motor scooter. APD had received an anonymous tip concerning two persons and a scooter with an ignition that “appeared to be tampered with.” The officers suspected that the scooter was stolen. After briefly speaking with Defendant and the woman, officers ran Defendant’s personal identification information and the scooter’s vehicle identification number (VIN) through the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) to check for outstanding warrants and any stolen vehicle reports. NCIC did not return a stolen vehicle report but did report Defendant’s outstanding felony warrants for trafficking drugs. Officers placed Defendant in handcuffs while they awaited confirmation that the warrants were valid. While Defendant was in custody, but before he was advised of his Miranda rights, an officer asked him, “Is there anything on your person that I should know about?” Defendant responded, “I have meth.” Officers collected a white powder from inside a pill container hanging from Defendant’s belt loop and placed it in a plastic evidence bag. After officers recovered the physical evidence, Defendant muttered, “Well, I’m gonna have another charge now.” The white powder recovered from Defendant’s belt loop tested positive for methamphetamine. As a result, Defendant was charged with felony possession of a controlled substance. At issue before the New Mexico Supreme Court was whether the officer's question to Defendant was sufficiently related to protecting officer safety to qualify for the public safety exception to the admissibility requirements of Miranda, announced in New York v. Quarles, 467 U.S. 649 (1984). The Court of Appeals determined that the question in this case did not qualify for the Quarles public safety exception, reversed Defendant's conviction for possession of methamphetamine, and remanded for a new trial. The Supreme Court disagreed, finding the Quarles public safety exception applied in this case because of the need to determine whether Defendant was armed or carrying potentially harmful drug paraphernalia before officers performed a pat-down search. The Court of Appeals was reversed and the matter remanded for further proceedings. View "New Mexico v. Widmer" on Justia Law

After retrial, defendant Matthew Sloan appealed his convictions for burglary and felony murder. At the second trial, the State presented evidence that defendant, armed with a rifle and accompanied by two other men, broke into the victim’s house to retrieve drugs or money from the victim and that defendant shot and killed the victim during the burglary. On appeal, defendant argued: (1) the district court denied him his right to be present and to confront witnesses against him by failing to determine whether he made a valid waiver of his right to be present at three pretrial hearings; (2) he received ineffective assistance from his trial counsel; and (3) the district court committed reversible error by declining to instruct the jury on voluntary manslaughter as a lesser included offense. Finding no reversible error, the New Mexico Supreme Court affirmed defendant's convictions. View "New Mexico v. Sloan" on Justia Law