Members of New Mexico Civil Guard get $300K from city in settlement (July 2020 ABQ "protest" [AKA riot])

The Albuquerque Journal ^ | April 19, 2023 | Colleen Heild

[CedarDave]

Six members of a private militia group who claimed their constitutional rights were violated when they were arrested after a protest turned violent at Tiguex Park in June 2020 will receive $300,000 to drop three lawsuits they filed against the city of Albuquerque, its top officials and Albuquerque police.

The city agreed to settle a federal civil rights lawsuit filed by the group in 2021 as well as two other lawsuits alleging the city failed to turn over public records about the incident in violation of the state Inspection of Public Records Act.

Still pending at the time of the settlement was a motion filed by the members of the New Mexico Civil Guard seeking release of records of all non-personal calls, including text messages, on Mayor Tim Keller’s personal cellphone for the month of June 2020.

The city and a private law firm representing Keller fought the release, maintaining in one court record that disclosure of “personal communication records” was “outside any possible relevance” to the IPRA request.

The event that triggered the litigation — and led to a separate injunction last year against the militia group — occurred after members of the New Mexico Civil Guard wearing camouflage suits and body armor brought sidearms and rifles to “keep the peace” at the June 15, 2020, protest at which organizers called for removal of the statue of Spanish conquistador Juan de Oñate.

The members weren’t charged criminally but were detained for hours as Albuquerque police investigated a non-fatal shooting that occurred during a scuffle between protesters and people who opposed damaging the statue. A man not affiliated with the militia, Steven Ray Baca,was arrested on aggravated assault charges in the non-fatal shooting. He is set for a jury trial June 20.

[CedarDave]

Links given below. The NM Civil Guard's presence was the only reason why the antifa thugs didn't kill Baca because the police weren't there; they were hiding out behind some buildings at the order of the mayor and/or chief of police until after shots were filed. There was a minor scuffle involving Baca at the monument while the protestors were attempting to bring it down. However, like a group of angry wasps, the mob turned on Baca, attacked him, and chased him down the street. As a masked one was in the process of hitting him with a steel tipped skateboard, Baca drew and shot him, but not fatally. Baca dropped the gun and fell to the ground shaking after shooting. The Civil Guard surrounded him and kept the mob from attacking and beating him. They stayed there while the police and sheriff deputies arrived to disarm them.

https://www.abqjournal.com/1466626/one-man-shot-during-protest-in-old-town-albuquerque.html

https://www.abqjournal.com/1475487/charges-refiled-against-baca-in-protest-shooting.html

(For ABQ Journal articles requiring a subscription, you are allowed a number of free article views.)

[CedarDave]

Albuquerque police take armed members of the New Mexico Civil Guard into custody on June 15, 2020, after a man was shot while demonstrators tried to take down the statue of Juan de Oñate in Old Town. The militia members were later released after police arrested a man not affiliated with the group . (Adolph Pierre-Louis/Albuquerque Journal)

[CedarDave]

Lots more article detail at the original link.

[CedarDave]

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(For ABQ Journal articles requiring a subscription, you are allowed a number of free article views.)

[linMcHlp]

bkmk

[CedarDave]

The District Attorney at the time, Soros backed Attorney Raúl Torrez was elected NM State Attorney General last November. No need to guess what type of justice Baca and conservatives in particular will get from him. He already has injunctions against cities in SE NM who are trying to stop Texas abortion clinics from setting up baby chop shops in NM.

[A strike]

Seems the real fascists get off easy (Democrat state actors, FBI, DoJ, CIA)
and not never personally for violating the US Constitution.

[NetAddicted]

Read later.

[A strike]

Citizens of the UnitedStates exercising their Second Amendment rights are not a threat to legitimate law enforcement. The officers responsible for this CRIMINAL arrest should be prosecuted.

[BenLurkin]

If the Spanish, et al had not come to the New World 500 years ago, how much progress would the Pre-Columbian cultures have made in the last 500 years?

Would any of them invented the wheel (they still hadn’t yet by the time civilization arrived), developed steam engines, or learned how to master powered flight?

I kind of doubt it.

[NetAddicted]

Read later. I lived in Santa Fe for 3 years. Fell in love with NM and green chile. Nobody here makes green chile like Santa Fe cooks. Closest I’ve found is green chile stew at Village Inn, which I spread on omelet.

[ConservativeMind]

These men did a civic duty.

Our police are too often disgusting in what they do, and don't do, it seems.

What did those men do to be brought in? They protected, in a non-violent way, another person.

[coloradan]

“...alleging the city failed to turn over public records about the incident in violation of the state Inspection of Public Records Act.”

If they violated the law they should be prosecute rather than paying taxpayer money to those they wronged.

Oh that’s right, it’s not a crime when they do it. Nothing is ever a crime when they do it.