This decision was not selected for publication in the New Mexico Appellate Reports. Please see Rule 12-405 NMRA for restrictions on the citation of non-precedential dispositions. Please also note that this electronic decision may contain computer-generated errors or other deviations from the official paper version filed by the Supreme Court. DISPOSITIONAL ORDER OF REVERSAL JOHN A. DEAN, Jr., District Judge. {1} The above-entitled and numbered appeal having come before the Supreme Court,...
OPINION CH VES , Justice . {1} Respondent Djamila B. (Guardian) was appointed by a family court as kinship guardian to Mahdjid and Aliah (Children). Petitioner Children, Youth and Families Department (CYFD) brought abuse and neglect proceedings in children's court against Guardian and Children's biological parents pursuant to the Abuse and Neglect Act (ANA), NMSA 1978, 32A-4-1 to -34 (1993, as amended through 2009). Prior to seeking adoption for Children, CYFD filed a motion to dismiss...
OPINION PER CURIAM . { 1} In the waning hours of the 2014 legislative session, the Legislature passed the General Appropriations Act of 2014, 2014 N.M. Laws, ch. 63, 1-14 (Appropriations Act), which included a pair of salary increases for judges and justices of the New Mexico state judiciary (collectively, judges). The first increase, funded in Section 4(B) of the Appropriations Act, was a 5% raise, the appropriation for which was lumped in with various other appropriations to the...
OPINION MAES , Justice . {1} When a worker's injury "results from the negligence of the employer in failing to supply reasonable safety devices in general use for the use or protection of the worker," the Workers' Compensation Act (the Act) provides that a worker's benefits shall be increased by 10%. NMSA 1978, 52-1-1 to -70 (1929, as amended through 2013). In this case we determine whether a "wet floor" sign is a safety device and whether a nurse who slips on a recently mopped floor...
OPINION CH VEZ, Justice. { 1} Antonio T., a seventeen-year-old high school student, was taken to Assistant Principal Vanessa Sarna's (Ms. Sarna) office because he was suspected of being under the influence of alcohol. Possession of alcohol by a minor is a delinquent act under NMSA 1978, Section 32A-2-3(A)(2) (2009) of the Children's Code. Ms. Sarna questioned Antonio about his possession of alcohol in the presence of Deputy Sheriff Emerson Charley, Jr. (the Deputy), who was assigned to the...
OPINION DANIELS, Justice. {1} In this medical negligence case, we reaffirm New Mexico's longstanding commitment to the nontechnical fair notice requirements of Rule 1-008 NMRA, "General rules of pleading." Plaintiff William "Mack" Vaughan alleges that, as the result of a communication failure between a surgeon and a contract radiologist, Defendant St. Vincent Hospital failed to tell Vaughan about his cancer diagnosis. The district court granted summary judgment for St. Vincent because...
This decision was not selected for publication in the New Mexico Appellate Reports. Please see Rule 12-405 NMRA for restrictions on the citation of non-precedential dispositions. Please also note that this electronic decision may contain computer-generated errors or other deviations from the official paper version filed by the Supreme Court. DISPOSITIONAL ORDER OF REVERSAL EDWARD L. CH VEZ, Justice. {1} This direct appeal having come before the full Court, the Justices having read the...
OPINION CH VEZ , Justice . {1} This case is a direct appeal from a final order of the Public Regulation Commission (PRC) granting a permanent certificate to American Medical Response Ambulance Service, Inc. d/b/a American Medical Response, Emergicare (AMR) for both emergency and non-emergency ambulance service in Valencia County. Living Cross Ambulance Service, Inc. (Living Cross) asks this Court to vacate the final order of the PRC, claiming that the PRC acted arbitrarily and...
OPINION CH VEZ, Justice. {1} Petitioner Kathrin M. Kinzer-Ellington (Kinzer-Ellington) was appointed guardian ad litem pursuant to Rule 1-053.3 NMRA to serve as an arm of the court in determining the best interests of minor children whose parents were involved in a custody dispute. Kimbrell v. Kimbrell, 2013-NMCA-070, 2, ___ N.M. ___, 306 P.3d 495 , cert. granted, 2013-NMCERT-006, ___ N.M. ___, 304 P.3d 426 . As the case grew more and more contentious, W. David Kimbrell (Father)...
OPINION MAES, Justice. {1} In these consolidated appeals, we consider whether pharmacists who dispense prescription drugs to Medicaid recipients must be paid under the formula set forth in NMSA 1978, Section 27-2-16(B) (1984). Section 27-2-16(B) provides that the New Mexico Human Services Department (HSD) pay participating pharmacists the wholesale cost of the generic brand plus a dispensing fee of at least three dollars sixty-five cents ($3.65). Section 27-2-16(B) was enacted when New...
OPINION BOSSON, Justice. {1} Once again, we are tasked with unraveling the confusing interplay between an accused's Sixth Amendment right "to be confronted with the witnesses against him," and our rape shield law designed to protect a victim's privacy. U.S. Const. amend. VI, NMSA 1978, Section 30-9-16 (1993). Here, the alleged victim, the accused's girlfriend, was the sole material witness against him for the crime of kidnapping with the intent to commit a sexual offense. On cross-...
OPINION BOSSON, Justice. {1} This criminal prosecution under NMSA 1978, Section 30-6-1 (2005) alleged intentional and negligent child abuse causing great bodily harm to an infant. A jury returned a guilty verdict, which our Court of Appeals affirmed in a memorandum opinion. State v. Consaul, No. 29,559, mem. op. at 2, 2012 WL 868811 (N.M.Ct.App. Feb. 20, 2012) (non-precedential). {2} In our certiorari review of that conviction, we hold first that under the particular circumstances of...
OPINION DANIELS, Justice. This case involves factually related issues of the boundaries between proper and improper prosecutorial conduct in dealing with recalcitrant witnesses and of the circumstances in which a mistrial and retrial may take place without violating constitutional double jeopardy protections when a witness does not appear for trial. Following federal double jeopardy principles in United States Supreme Court precedent, we conclude that a prosecution witness's failure to appear...
OPINION DANIELS, Justice. {1} In this property tax case, we hold that the appropriate inquiry into the validity of a property's educational exemption from taxation under the exemption provision of Article VIII, Section 3 of the New Mexico Constitution is whether use during the tax year furthers the exempt purpose. Because the taxpayer in this case had only used the property for educational purposes, had declined to use it for noneducational purposes, and was actively negotiating with schools...
DISPOSITIONAL ORDER OF AFFIRMANCE BOSSON, Justice. {1} This direct appeal having come before the Supreme Court from a Third Judicial District Court's order and sentencing, and every member of the Court having considered the briefs, and being otherwise fully informed on the issues and applicable law; and {2} The members of the Court having concurred that there is no reasonable likelihood that a decision or opinion would affect the disposition of this appeal or advance the law of the State;...
OPINION DANIELS, Justice. I. INTRODUCTION {1} Over a century ago, the New Mexico Territorial Legislature enacted a civil marital property statute, now codified as NMSA 1978, Section 40-3-3 (1907), recognizing rights of married women to hold separate property but providing that "neither [husband nor wife] can be excluded from the other's dwelling." In this criminal case based on events that occurred in 2008, a jury found Defendant Gerard Parvilus guilty of aggravated burglary of his...
OPINION MAES, Justice. {1} In these consolidated cases, Pinghua Zhao, Gregg Fallick, and Janet Fallick (Homeowners) appeal the valuation of their residences for property tax purposes as a result of what they allege is "tax lightning," also known as acquisition-value taxation. Under acquisition-value taxation, a real estate owner's property tax liability is determined by the value of the property when acquired, not by the traditional practice of taxing real property on its current fair market...
OPINION VIGIL, Chief Justice. {1} With this opinion we address whether, pursuant to Article II, Section 10 of the New Mexico Constitution, Kevyn Crane (Defendant) had a reasonable expectation of privacy in garbage left out for collection in a motel dumpster. The district court found that Defendant did have such an expectation, and it entered an order suppressing evidence obtained in the dumpster, as well as evidence later obtained by a warrant, which it found was the proverbial fruit of the...
This decision was not selected for publication in the New Mexico Appellate Reports. Please see Rule 12-405 NMRA for restrictions on the citation of non-precedential dispositions. Please also note that this electronic decision may contain computer-generated errors or other deviations from the official paper version filed by the Supreme Court. DECISION MAES, Justice. {1} In this case we review the district court's decision to sentence seventeen-year-old Defendant Michael Evans as an adult for...
OPINION BOSSON, Justice. {1} On December 18, 2013, the undersigned panel of this Court granted a peremptory writ of superintending control directing the district court to determine whether to impose a mandatory life sentence on Defendant, Anthony Samora, after his second conviction for criminal sexual penetration (CSP) in the second degree. We write to explain our decision and to provide guidance for future courts regarding the interplay between NMSA 1978, Section 31-18-25(F) (1997) (...
