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Gov. Bill Richardson said Friday that he and his party stayed 30 minutes at the scene of Saturday’s houseboat accident at Elephant Butte State Park.
But the eyewitness who told NMI the governor left within two or three minutes is standing firm on his version of the events.
And the two parks officers who responded to last Saturday’s accident bolstered that account late Friday, when they said through an agency spokesperson that they did not see the governor or his chief of staff, Brian Condit, when they arrived on the scene, 20 minutes after the crash.
Richardson’s statement puts him at odds with Carl Shaw Jr., the owner of one of the boats damaged in Saturday’s accident. Shaw told the Independent Wednesday that he saw the governor, his chief of staff, Brian Condit, budget chief Katherine Miller and others in their party leave the scene within two to three minutes of the docking of the houseboat they were on.
But that’s not how Richardson tells the story.
“First of all, it was 30 minutes that we waited,” the governor said Friday, when asked by the Independent why his party had left the scene of the accident so quickly.
Richardson made the statement during an appearance at the New Mexico State Fair, but was whisked away in a golf cart before the Independent could ask more questions.
Reached Friday, Shaw stood firm on his version of events.
“I am going to stand by what I said earlier in the week — that and many other witnesses,” Shaw said. “There is no doubt in my mind that it was two or three minutes at the max.”
Shaw’s account of the governor’s departure from the dam marina at Elephant Butte State Park following a boat accident caused by his chief of staff, Brian Condit, generated a minor media storm.
Several news sites in Washington, D.C. picked up the story. But with his comment Friday Richardson contested it.
Friday was the first time Richardson has spoken publicly about the timing of his departure from the marina at the state park. And it appeared to cloud the issue, especially in the arena of trying to resolve the disparity in the amount of time between the two accounts – the governor’s and Shaw’s.
Shaw declined to speculate on the difference between his recollection and the governor’s.
Apart from making sense of the dueling time frames, Richardson’s comment raises a new question: Why didn’t park enforcement officers note the presence of Richardson, Condit and the rest of the party at the scene when they arrived?
The report does not make mention of the presence of Richardson, Condit or anyone else in their party.
The report’s author, Chris Bolen, noted that he and another officer called to the scene were quickly “called away to an injury accident shortly after.” The two men returned to the scene less than an hour later to interview several witnesses, including Shaw.
It is still unclear why Condit waited two days to contact the officers and give his account of the accident.
Condit was eventually cited for operating a vessel in a negligent manner and damaging another person’s property.
The witnesses Bolen and the other officer interviewed appeared to recall the same sequence of events leading up to and during Saturday’s boat accident, which is recounted in the incident report:
A man later identified as Condit was seen operating “Bloody Mary,” a houseboat owned by Leon “Skip” Fay of Rio Rancho. Condit piloted the houseboat into the marina, but came too close to C-dock, sideswiping Shaw’s houseboat. Then the “Bloody Mary” accelerated. At this point Fay took control from Condit, but it was too late, witnesses said. The houseboat, thrust by momentum, headed across the slip toward D-dock and smashed into a second houseboat, “The Floating Irish.”
The incident report estimates the damage to “The Floating Irish” at more than $10,000. The reporting officer writes also that the owners of the Dam Site marina told him that underwater structures below D-dock were damaged. Shaw’s houseboat suffered very minimal damage.
Condit told Bolen that he had not been drinking alcohol at the time of the accident.
Shaw said Friday that his boat had suffered only nominal damage, and that he is not pursuing any damages.
