Michael McGarrity is a former deputy sheriff for Santa Fe County. For the release of his 13th novel, titled Hard Country: A Novel of the Old West, he asked Valerie Plame Wilson, a former CIA Operations Officer and author of Fair Game: My Life as a Spy, My Betrayal by the White House to interview him at Collected Works Bookstore.

As I once had to explain to a semi-hysterical caller to SFR, we regularly report on political corruption, burglary, homicide, rape and more. Just because we run a story about something doesn’t mean we condone it. Apropos, burglary, homicide, rape, etc. collectively form the subject of this week’s Big Picture: crime.

Long before Jerome Block Jr.’s third arrest for violating the conditions of his drug court program, the New Mexico Public Regulation Commission had problems. In 2007, former Commissioner David King was convicted of sexually harassing his assistant; in 2008, Block and his father, Jerome Block Sr., faced allegations of election violations; in 2009, former Commissioner Carol Sloan attacked a rival with a rock.

Randal Peifer has been using St. Elizabeth Shelter for the past 20 years, about as long as he’s been homeless. He lives just feet away from the shelter near the back lot of a gas station. He sleeps under trees and bushes with a blanket and newspapers to keep him warm at night.

After City Councilor Patti Bushee kept hearing horror stories involving drug deals, burglary and loitering from her constituents, she decided to hold a public meeting about it. Roughly 40 people, including cops, showed up to the Sept. 12 meeting, which focused on crime near the Railyard [news, Sept. 14, “Relapse”].

This summer, Block’s life began to unravel again with another series of absurd, but completely plausible, allegations of malfeasance. Of them, the most disgusting is evidence indicating Block may have improperly charged thousands of dollars to government credit cards.

The 1st Judicial District encompasses Santa Fe County and Rio Arriba County, which has the highest per capita heroin overdose rate in the nation. District Judge Stephen Pfeffer says most of the drug-related search warrants he issues occur in Rio Arriba County. He says he signs roughly two drug-related warrants a month.

Declining revenues and rising costs have put the prison in financial trouble. Some officials say the county can’t handle the expense, and they’ve proposed a solution: return the jail’s medical care to private management.