Gallegos whistleblower went to work for judge's ex-husband.
Jeremy Hanika left his job at Santa Fe Municipal Court about a year ago with plans to go to law school. ***image1***But for at least the last few months he was employed by Gryphon Group Protective Services as a security guard.
His employer?
His former employer's ex-husband.
Hanika is the primary accuser in an Aug. 7 front-page Santa Fe New Mexican story that reports allegations that Muni Judge Frances Gallegos systematically altered court documents to make her DWI sentencing record appear more stringent.
SFR has learned that as recently as Aug. 5, Hanika was employed as a security guard by Gallegos' ex-husband Michael Trujillo who, ***image2***in addition to being part owner of Gryphon Group Protective Services, is chairman of the New Mexico State Police Advisory Commission and sits on the Santa Fe Planning Commission.
Hanika could not be reached for comment. Trujillo confirmed to SFR that Hanika had been in his employ.
"I knew somewhere along the line this was going to come up," Trujillo says. "I would be honest if Jeremy had come in and we talked about Fran but that never happened. I made it clear to him that we were not to talk about anything having to do with his experience working in the court. It's really important for people to understand that."
Gallegos is no stranger to controversy. She was criticized in May 2004 after a DWI Resource Center in Albuquerque report alleged more than 90 percent of DWI offenders convicted in municipal court didn't spend any time in jail. Gallegos claimed the statistics were the result of clerical errors that had failed to include jail sentences on the reports provided to the state's Motor Vehicles Division. She subsequently initiated the amendment of as many as 800 DWI cases to correct the oversight.
The New Mexican's Aug. 7 story alleges Gallegos altered the documents to reflect stricter sentences than were actually handed down. The story analyzed 13 of the amended reports and found the information on six of them to be incongruent with the original judgments and jail records.
The sources which corroborated the allegations that Gallegos altered the documents were an anonymous municipal court employee and the 26-year-old Hanika.
Hanika told the New Mexican he refused to send documents that he suspected of being altered to the MVD, lest he become an "accomplice." He says he resigned in July 2004 in order to enroll in law school with dreams of becoming a judge.
After the story broke, an independent contractor (who requested anonymity for this story) working out of the Municipal Court building came forward to Gallegos' office with allegations that she witnessed Hanika forge a letter of recommendation from Gallegos for law school.
Mary Ann Caldwell-the Municipal Court Administrator and Hanika's direct supervisor-says she contacted the admissions department at the New England School of Law-where Hanika is purportedly enrolled-on Aug. 8 to inquire about the letter of recommendation.
Gallegos says she doesn't recall writing the letter. "After reading through this [letter of recommendation], there are so many typos in it that I would never have allowed it to be sent out. My name is even misspelled."
A copy of the glowing letter obtained by SFR contains the typed name "Judge France Gallegos."
According to Gallegos and Caldwell, the accompanying signature at the bottom of the letter appears to be the imprint of a stamp bearing the judge's signature that is typically used for routine court documents.
"That stamp was made for use in the court for documents that I don't personally have to sign," Gallegos says.
NESL Dean of Admissions Michelle L'Etoile declined to comment.
"I'm not at liberty to discuss it," L'Etoile says. "Due to privacy concerns we do not discuss personal matters involving our students with the public."
As for the allegations against Gallegos, which have prompted Gov. Bill Richardson to seek an investigation, the judge refuted the charges in an Aug. 8 press release.
"I never altered the judgment and sentencing from which this data was retrieved," the statement reads. "The purpose of the amended abstracts was to correct the clerical errors that resulted in specific information not accurately reported to the motor vehicle division."
Gallegos declined to comment on the specific reported discrepancies and says she will wait for a thorough investigation by the Judicial Standards Commission. Gallegos sent SFR a copy of a request she sent to the Judicial Standards Commission requesting an evaluation of "the alleged altering of DWI records" reported by the New Mexican and also said she had placed several calls to the governor's office requesting a face-to-face meeting. Gallegos has been reprimanded twice during her nearly 10 years on the bench. Once for moving outside the city limits and once for referring defendants in her court to attend a driving-safety course operated by Caldwell.
Nonetheless, Gallegos claims that while she was contacted by New Mexican reporter Jason Auslander for the story two to three weeks ago, the story had no bearing on her Aug. 2 announcement that she would not be running for mayor.
"I had made up my mind way before that," she says. "I didn't even know what the story was going to be about."
Michael Trujillo says she wasn't the only one.
"I've had 100 people who knew Jeremy worked for me come up and ask me what happened," Trujillo says. "I don't have a clue. When this broke on Sunday morning, I was absolutely stunned. I didn't have a clue that this was coming down the pike. Jeremy came in on Friday [August 5] to say goodbye and he didn't say a word about it."
Trujillo says Hanika has since left the state, presumably to prepare for his fall semester at NESL.
Trujillo acknowledges his Christmas, 2001 split with Gallegos was not amicable, but says he has always been careful about warding off conflicts of interest.
"We're both very public people and one thing I made a habit of is to never ever have my business involved with her business," Trujillo says. "She stayed out of mine and I stayed out of hers…I'm sorry this has happened. But, being aware of the political aspect, I know that there are always two sides to a story. I'm not passing any judgment."
Leave that to the judge. Gallegos says she was unaware Hanika was an employee of her ex-husband's until after the story broke.
"The question I have is that Jeremy has been gone from this office for over a year," she says. "If he had these papers and these concerns, why did he not bring that up at least to his supervisor? Why did he wait until now?"
Update, Aug. 20, 2014: Fran Gallegos resigned from her position in November 2005 after the state Supreme Court suspended her for 90 days and the State Police filed forgery charges against her. A year later, a state District Court judge ruled that she showed incompetence but not criminal intent, dismissing the charges. Jeremy Hanika graduated from New England Law in 2008 and has since been permitted to practice before the US Patent and Trademark Office. He worked as an associate for the district attorney in New Mexico’s Eighth District for a year and is now an active member of the state bar in California and New Mexico. He maintains that the forgery allegations leveled by Gallegos were false and occurred in retaliation for blowing the whistle on her record-keeping practices.
Santa Fe Reporter