Cold, drunk and high, an Albuquerque woman crawled into the El Centro Family Health clinic in Embudo, looking for a warm place after being dropped off near the highway, and is now facing breaking and entering charges.
New Mexico State Police Officer Julian Lucero charged Rachel Ortiz, 37, with one count of breaking and entering on April 28.
Lucero wrote in a criminal complaint for her arrest that officers were sent to the clinic for a commercial alarm being triggered inside the building. Officers arrived at 1:59 a.m. and saw “bags of miscellaneous items in the parking lot” before they started checking all the doors. Lucero spotted an open window at the back of the building and another officer found an unlocked door, through which they entered.
Once inside, they found Ortiz, ordering her to lay flat on the floor before handcuffing her, he wrote.
Ortiz told them she was dropped off by a friend near the highway and crawled in through an open window, Lucero wrote.
“Rachel stated she entered the building because she was cold,” he wrote. “She also stated she had been drinking and smoking marijuana and was disoriented, claiming she did not know what was going on. Rachel acknowledged and understood that she was not supposed to be inside the facility.”
She was released later that morning on her personal recognizance and ordered to report to pre-trial services by Rio Arriba Magistrate Judge Joseph Madrid. A status conference is set for May 28.
Ortiz was previously charged with child abuse in 2022 by Santa Fe Police officers, in an incident where she allegedly tried to get multiple people to take care of her baby for her, and told officers that she was homeless. Prosecutors dismissed that case, writing it was in the “interests of justice.”