SANTA FE, N.M.—A Santa Fe man arrested at least 11 times on drunken-driving charges has been freed on his most recent case because prosecutors failed to show up in court or present evidence against him.
District Attorney Angela Pacheco told the Santa Fe New Mexican “there is no excuse” for her office not prosecuting the case against John Paul Chavez, 51.
The New Mexican reports ( ) that for more than five weeks, Pacheco’s office failed to have a prosecutor attend a hearing in the case or turn over evidence.
A state district judge was forced to dismiss the felony DWI case against Chavez on July 18.
In 2002, Chavez, in a self-described drunken blackout, ran down Colorado tourists Michael and Helen Cote as they crossed a street, dragging the woman under his truck for several blocks. She was in a coma for six weeks and still has mental and physical limitations.
Chavez was sentenced to 8 1/2 years in prison in that case. Nine other DWI arrests got him a total of less than three weeks in jail between 1982 and 2002.
After Chavez ended a six-year stay in prison in April 2009 and his parole ended in January 2010, Chavez was arrested twice on charges of driving without a license. He was arrested again in December when state police say he drove away from a Santa Fe strip club while drunk and refused to take a blood-alcohol test twice.
That most recent case was the one dismissed July 18 with prejudice, meaning Chavez will never have to face the charges.
“This is so absurd,” Helen Cote said Tuesday from her home in Durango, Colo. “This is outrageous, actually. The fact that he can continue doing this, that he gets out and is back doing the same thing and the system still isn’t doing anything about it—I just can’t feel anything but full astonishment at this.”
Pacheco, the district attorney, agreed.
“This case, it’s outrageous that it happened,” she said. “It’s hard for us to really say anything about it without making it sound like we’re trying to give an excuse, and I am not doing that.”
Pacheco said the case was assigned to a prosecutor who had been in and out of the hospital for months, including between Chavez’s Feb. 14 arraignment and a July 15 docket call in which his case was finally dismissed.
The prosecutor resigned in late July and had never made an appearance in open court. At three different hearings, Chavez’s defense attorney, Val Whitley, asked State District Judge Vigil to force the state to hand over evidence in the case so they could prepare for trial.
“Even though I filed motions and kept asking the judge in court for the discovery, nothing ever happened,” Whitley said. “No one even entered an appearance, and I let the court know several times.”
Whitley said that before the case was dismissed, Chavez had been on electronic monitoring for nearly six months without violation. Because of the dates of some of Chavez’s prior DWI cases and problems with legally proving other convictions, prosecutors believed they only would have been able to prove that he had three prior DWI convictions, making his latest charge a fourth-offense case. That would be a third-degree felony that carries between six and 18 months behind bars upon conviction.
Pacheco said she had thought her office had all of the absent prosecutor’s cases covered while he was out.
The Cotes, meanwhile, both said Tuesday that they don’t live a day without some reminder of how their lives changed on that September day in Santa Fe.
“When I think about all this, when I flash upon (Chavez), I don’t know for sure anymore who I’m more angry with that this continues to happen,” Helen Cote said. “The fact that he can continue to do this and the system can’t seem to stop him is just a frustrating reality, I guess.”
While Helen Cote has yet to regain any memory of that day, Michael Cote said he still struggles with trying to forget it as daily reminders haunt him.
“It’s heartbreaking,” Michael Cote said. “I mean, how many chances is this guy going to get to hurt people?”
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Information from: The Santa Fe New Mexican,
