Las Cruces is exceptional for its police department’s combination of misconduct, dishonesty, and stupidity. The current epitome of this combination is Police Chief Miguel Dominguez. Promoted as an incompetent but compliant tool on the advice of the City Attorney, Dominguez began by touting himself as “Mr. Transparency,” initiating an LCPD webpage on transparency, and gracing it with his mug shot (since removed).
His record for honesty was tarnished before his promotion—which likely established his qualifications for promotion. After the May 2020 police killing of George Floyd, nationwide protests, and the fad for “8 Can’t Wait” proposals, then Deputy Police Chief Dominguez testified before City Council on 15 June 2020. Ignoring the February 2020 chokehold killing of Antonio Valenzuela by LCPD Officer Christopher Smelser—“I’m going to fucking choke you out, bro”—, Dominguez pleaded for tea and sympathy for the Las Cruces Police Department.
“Our officers are professionals. ... We will respond to your calls without fail. We know that there’s a lot of mistrust out there. We want you to know you can count on us. We are all professionals doing a tough job. We are not perfect. We make mistakes. We will own up to our mistakes. We love Las Cruces. We are a tight community. We are Las Cruces. We are here to back you up. Please reach out to us and know we are a professional organization. We really do care about our community.” (Las Cruces Sun-News, 17 June)
The enablers of police misconduct and dishonesty on City Council and in the media columns and radio programs accepted his lachrymose pleas and pro forma assurances without question (if so, why is there “a lot of mistrust”). Those accepting such drivel are lickspittles and a part of the continuing problem of a police department out of control.
Consider that my Councilor Kasandra Gandara, Councilor Johanna Bencomo, and media maven Peter Goodman—all of whom had intimate knowledge of LCPD misconduct and dishonesty in my case—did and said absolutely nothing to support my attempt to resolve it (it remains unresolved by a city government determined not to resolve it. How comforting to them that Dominguez claims, “We will own up to our mistakes.” “Will?” I should live so long.) I can think of no clearer message to the LCPD that city officials and media commentators do not care about LCPD misconduct and dishonesty, at least on a small scale (thought it affects many citizens). Their moral standards, such as they are, compartmentalize conduct and honesty; they care only and only a little about costly settlements (after all, always failing to reform the police means always funding damage suits). By ensuring that my case did not go to the police auditor, both councilors did not miss, but acted to prevent, an easy opportunity to link conduct and honesty, and begin to elevate the LCPD’s ethical and professional performance.
My case was minor-league preparation for major league misconduct and dishonesty. Unsurprisingly, given their example of indifference to truth, Chief Dominguez responded to the misconduct by Officer Jared Cosper in killing Sra. Amelia Baca with dishonest ploys: a lie and a misleading PR flick. Lie: Dominguez claimed that Cosper had over 70 hours of de-escalation training; truth: records show about 40 hours of training related to de-escalation. Misrepresentation: Dominguez initiated a video production with edited bod-cam footage and editorial voice-over, including the same claim about Cosper’s training. Dominguez’s dishonesty about misconduct can be explained by the Mayor and Councilors’ signal that police deceit to mitigate criminal behavior is no vice. So the more officials lie, the worse police conduct gets, and the more misconduct and dishonesty flourish.
What is astonishing about this display of dishonesty about misconduct is its display of stupidity. Dominguez and others in the LCPD like Kiri Daines, Deputy Police Chief, thought, in developing the PR flick, that no one would discover and disclose the facts about the killing at some point. My IPRA outed the original, complete bod-came with audio of the killing; Sun-News reporter Justin Chavez’s IPRA outed Cosper’s identity and training. I had discovered the night before and Chavez proved that Cosper was a K-9 officer, not an obvious first choice for a responder to a mental-health call, especially if he had worked overtime the day before.
At the most recent meeting of the Progressive Voters Alliance, Councilor Tessa Abeyta “spoke about ‘Lift Up Las Cruces,’ which is a plan being developed to deal proactively with crime and community safety.” All of the right words in the right order: plan, developed, deal, proactively, crime, community, safety. Only missing is a word about policy; Councilor Abeyta had better get that in if she wants the support of Councilor Bencomo, who loves policies as solutions to others’ problems. The problem for Council’s one man and six women, aside from their inability to meet their own deadlines, is that none of them knows how to ensure that a plan or a policy can or will be implemented by an amiable City Manager, supported by a disapproving City Attorney, and enforced by a discredited and weak Police Chief.
As I have written before, DA Gerald Byers is likely not to charge Officer Jared Cosper. The DA will brave public disapproval by appeals to the officer’s years of service, the failures of training, his exhaustion from overwork, and more such drool. Lickspittles will not so easily lap up Dominguez’s sloppy performance. Nevertheless, city officials and media mavens are probably sufficiently hardened to police misconduct, dishonesty, and stupidity that they will deem it better for the City Manager to keep the devil they know than for him to seek a devil they do not. However, although he has no standards of police performance, he might fire Dominguez to give the appearance that he does.
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