Charges filed against a Santa Fe man in connection with an incident in which he allegedly tried to strike an Española Police officer with his car were dismissed after the officer was terminated, according to the District Attorney’s office.
Patrick Burns, 56, had been charged with two counts of aggravated assault on a police officer and one count of reckless driving for the Dec. 13, 2008, incident, in which he allegedly charged at officer Emily Montoya after she gave him a speeding ticket, according to court documents.
Montoya claimed in her report that Burns yelled expletives at her while driving toward her on Riverside Drive when she was at an unrelated traffic stop. Earlier in the day, Montoya had cited Burns for speeding, documents state.
“The only evidence we have is what this officer said happened, and she obviously is facing her own legal problems at this point,” Assistant District Attorney Tim Hasson said Tuesday. “Her report stated her (car-mounted video recorder) was not working that day — the videos are usually activated whenever you run with lights and sirens.”
Hasson also said Montoya claimed other officers were present but didn’t produce any reports from them.
The fact that an officer has been terminated doesn’t necessarily mean they aren’t credible, or that a case can’t be prosecuted, Hasson said.
“You have to review it to determine whether there are credibility problems related to the firing that may interfere with the state’s attempt to prosecute a case,” Hasson said.
Montoya was terminated Jan. 9, two weeks after bragging to the SUN that she had kicked an elderly man after he damaged a light on her property. Internal police memos showed Española Police Sgt. Christian Lopez urged management to put Montoya on leave in October 2008 until she could be given a psychiatric evaluation and a drug test. His request came after Montoya allegedly cursed at evidence custodian Christine Gerhmann and antagonized Det. Bryan Martinez, according to the memos.
Acting City Manager Veronica Albin said Montoya has requested a public name-clearing to be held at a City Council meeting. Interim City Attorney Paula Maynes is working with Montoya to arrange the hearing, possibly at a Council meeting this month, Albin said. Montoya is not appealing her termination.
“Essentially it’s a public forum for her to be able to rebut what was said about her in your newspaper,” Albin said. “It doesn’t have anything to do with her employment with the city of Española, it has everything to do with all the nasty things that you guys wrote.”
Montoya did not return a call for comment.
Prior to her latest stint with the city, Montoya had been a corporal with Los Alamos County Police Department between 2003 and 2007. Her personnel file from that agency reveals she was given a 5 percent pay cut in December 2006, shortly after her supervisor questioned the County information technology manager about possible problems with Montoya’s County email service, according to County personnel documents. Montoya was claiming she never received certain emails, which the information technologist was able to prove she had both received and moved to a different folder.
Montoya resigned from Los Alamos County in November 2007 with disciplinary action pending against her and did not give two weeks’ notice, according to documents. She was listed as ineligible for rehire.
Burns’ lawyer Marc Edwards said he will be filing a tort notice before March 13 notifying Española Police of Burns’ intention to sue for negligent hiring, negligent retention, negligent supervision and negligent training of Montoya.
“(Montoya) flat-out lied about what happened to Mr. Burns,” Edwards said.
Burns said he was put on leave from his job as a teacher at Santa Fe High School from the day of his arrest until the Human Resources Department received a letter from the District Attorney’s office stating they found no basis for the charges against him and did not intend to pursue them.
“(Montoya) was trying to get me fired, don’t ask me why,” Burns said Tuesday. “Apparently this woman is extremely unstable — I keep getting calls from people, I guess there’s a lot of people that she unjustly went after or didn’t go after as the case may be.”