I am writing today to announce the closure of the New Mexico Independent. After three and a half years of operation in New Mexico, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news…
While environmental activists played their part yesterday during demonstrations at the capitol building, going so far as to dress up as solar panels and to sing the tune of “You Are My Sunshine,” their counterparts, the anti-cap-and-trade contingency who has…
Roughly one quarter of University of New Mexico students are unimpressed with the state’s flagship public school, according to a survey that questioned college students about their higher education experiences.
New Mexico Motor Transportation Division officers in Lordsburg have been targeting African-American truck drivers for detention, inspection and search, alleges a lawsuit filed in federal court (PDF) by the American Civil Liberties Union of New Mexico.
“Virtually every truck driver charged criminally in federal court who was arrested by an MTD officer stationed in Lordsburg is African American/Black,” the ACLU’s suit says. Named in the lawsuit are one police officer, Ben Strain, as well as his captain, Tim Labier; the head of the Motor Transportation Division, Forrest Smith; and John Denko, Secretary of the Department of Public Safety.
The suit alleges that Strain’s bosses should have known that MTD officers in Lordsburg were targeting black truck drivers.
A spokesman for the Department of Public Safety declined to comment on the ACLU’s allegations, saying “As usual, it would be inappropriate for us to talk about pending litigation.”
“This is the outgrowth of a couple of attorneys working in Las Cruces who …have been tracking this for a while,” Peter Simonson, the executive director of ACLU said Friday. “They actually went back, through a public records request, and collected some data that really do show that there is something to be concerned about. There is a consistent disproportion of bookings in Hidalgo County jail.”
Some of the figures cited in the suit include:
–From April 7, 2005, through March 19, 2008, 5 percent of the people booked into the Hidalgo County Detention Center (HCDC) were black.
–During that period, 20 percent of people booked into HCDC by Metropolitan Transportation Department officers were black.
–During that period, 23 percent of the self-identified truck drivers booked into HCDC by MTD officers were black.
–During that period, 2 percent of people booked into HCDC by law enforcement agencies other than MTD were black.
–On December 19-20, 2008, a private investigator observed the ethnicity of truck drivers who stopped at truck stops at Interstate 10 exits in Lordsburg and found 13 percent were African-American/Black.
