Larry Barker Investigates

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – Larry Barker uncovers one of the biggest car theft rings ever in New Mexico Thursday night at 10 p.m.

NM’s most successful auto theft ring

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – From the outside, it looked like any number of other run-down auto-repair shops along Albuquerque’s East Central Avenue.

But behind the ramshackle facade lay what police say was one of the most prolific auto theft rings in the city’s history.

Anjum Tahir and Boback Sabeerin ran the operation for years. And while it’s impossible to tell for sure how far their reach stretched, Tahir and Sabeerin may have been responsible for hundreds of organized vehicle thefts around the metro area.

Car theft rings aren’t totally unheard of in New Mexico or around the country, but the scope of Tahir’s and Sabeerin’s operation put it in a different category.

It was the men’s longevity and their tactics, though, that really stood out.

“The simplicity of it was just incredible: how they did it and got away with it for an extended period of time without anybody picking up on it,” said Tim Fassler, a now-retired APD detective who oversaw a police investigation of the pair’s criminal enterprise.

A KRQE News 13 investigation reveals the key to making those tactics work: junked cars and Vehicle Identification Number plates.

Here’s how the scam worked: Tahir and Sabeerin would steal a vehicle, preferably a high-end model such as a BMW, a Hummer, a Lexus or a nice Ford pickup truck. Next, the pair would head for an auto auction, where they’d keep their eyes peeled for a wrecked or otherwise junked twin to one of the vehicles they’d stolen.

Tahir and Sabeerin would plunk down a few hundred bucks for the junked vehicle, pry off its VIN plate, then affix that plate to the hot car already in their possession.

And: Voila, a car with a new identity, ready for sale to the unsuspecting public for a substantial profit. They made their sales in parking lots and on street corners around the city.

“Let’s say you bought the salvage for $300,” Fassler explained. “You get a similar vehicle, switch the VIN numbers on it and you sell it to the public: in one case, $6,000 cash. That’s a whole lot of profit for a very little bit of work.”

Here’s an example of the men’s handiwork: They stole a Dodge Charger from a residence in the Northeast Heights. Two weeks later, they went to the insurance auto auction and bought a wrecked Charger for $700. They sold the stolen Charger to an unsuspecting victim for $11,000.

On another occasion, Tahir and Sabeerin stole a $14,000 BMW and retrofitted it with a VIN plate from a junked BMW they paid $1,200 for at the insurance auction.

Sandy Blalock of the New Mexico Recyclers’ Association told News 13 auto thieves live Tahir and Sabeerin commonly infiltrate the auto auctions.

“The value of a salvage to an auto thief is that they pay a very small amount for that vehicle, they usually tend to buy the very heavily damaged vehicles that really only have a value as far as scrap value,” Blalock said, adding that the scheme is particularly damaging in a place like New Mexico.

“It is a very big deal,” Blalock said. “The unrecovered auto theft rate in New Mexico is one of the highest in the country.”

It may not ever be possible to get a handle on the full breadth of the operation run by Tahir and Sabeerin.

“Potentially there’s a hundred victims out there right now without knowing they are driving a VIN switched stolen (vehicle),” APD auto theft detective Matt Morales said.

Detectives took nearly 30 vehicles and dozens of partially dismantled cars, trucks and SUVs out of the shop after a raid. It took nearly three days to catalog it all.

From there, the investigation turned to recovering vehicles from people who had unknowingly bought stolen vehicles from Tahir and Sabeerin on street corners and in vacant parking lots, police said. One of them was an elderly widow.

“This poor woman began to cry,” Fassler told KRQE News 13. “She paid $6,000 cash for it. She was alone. And I just felt for her because I have to do what I have to do. I have to take that vehicle back. The best we could do is prosecute the people who did this to her.”

As for Tahir and Sabeerin, they were convicted of auto theft and are now serving lengthy prison sentences.

But Blalock says they weren’t the only thieves using the VIN-switching scheme to sell stolen vehicles.

“They’re all over the state of New Mexico, and we have a high concentration of them right in the Albuquerque area,” he said.

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – KRQE News 13’s Larry Barker talks about his investigation into a City of Albuquerque unit that is set to air Tuesday night at 10 p.m.

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – When Lacresia Rivera needed to run to the store, she did it in style.

Rivera had a whole parking lot to choose from. Typically, she went with the Cadillac Escalade.

It was a sweet deal, given that Rivera wasn’t making a car payment or writing a check to an insurance company for the privilege of driving the high-end, luxury SUV around town. She also didn’t have to pay for gas.

How was Rivera able to pull it off??

She’s a civilian employee at the Albuquerque Police Department’s vehicle seizure unit. The Escalade was forfeited by a convicted drunk driver. Taxpayers were footing the bill for maintenance on the vehicle – and for the gas that went in it.

The whole arrangement is in direct violation of numerous city of Albuquerque rules and policies.

And, a KRQE News 13 investigation shows Rivera was not alone.

Anna Griego and Kyle Evans, two of her coworkers, also were commandeering seized vehicles from the city’s forfeiture lot, driving them around town and taking them home. In addition to the Escalade, KRQE has learned that the employees were driving Nissans, GMC trucks and Chevy pickups.

They ran up healthy fuel tabs, too. In 2013, Griego’s taxpayer-funded gas tab was more than $1,500. Evans charged the city for more than $2,000. And Rivera pumped more than $2,300 into the gas-guzzling Escalade she wasn’t supposed to be taking home.

A city ordinance directs APD to impound vehicles of convicted drunken drivers who are arrested on suspicion of DWI. The city can eventually force the driver to forfeit the vehicle. According to the ordinance, APD is supposed to sell forfeited vehicles at auction.

It was skipping that last step that allowed Rivera and the others to perpetrate their joyriding scheme.

For example: Michael Baca was arrested in 2011 on suspicion of aggravated DWI following a hit-and-run accident. Police seized his Escalade and, a year later, a judge ordered the SUV forfeited to the city.

But instead of selling the Escalade at auction as the ordinance spells out, APD spent $7,000 fixing it up. Rivera then grabbed the keys and used it as her personal take home vehicle. She did the same with a Ford Ranger that was forfeited by an accused drunk driver in 2008.

News 13 asked City Councilor Don Harris which part of the ordinance allows APD employees to take forfeited vehicles and use them for personal use.

“Oh, it doesn’t say that anywhere,” Harris said. “And in fact I think the ordinance does not even allow the city to do anything other than sell these vehicles.”

For her part, Rivera refused to answer questions about what she and the others were doing.

Last month, News 13 presented its findings to top city officials, including Chief Administrative Officer Rob Perry and interim Police Chief Allen Banks.

“Its an entirely unacceptable, unapproved situation,” Perry said, adding that the city is looking into the matter. “That internal affairs investigation is looking at how long this practice has been going on. It could be years, many years, the severity of the violations, and it will involve administrative and disciplinary process up to and including termination if necessary.”

APD Sgt. Donovan Rivera supervises the department’s seizure unit. He told News 13 the practice has been going on for years – since before he arrived in the unit. Sgt. Rivera said he was aware civilian employees were using forfeited vehicles for personal use, but he didn’t know it was wrong.

Banks said he has put a stop to the practice, but the departing interim chief stopped short of saying the employees would have to reimburse taxpayers for the gas and maintenance charges.

“That’s something we have to look into,” Banks said. “I can’t say I’m going to hold these employees accountable and make them pay this money back. They will no long have take-home vehicles … and we will look to make sure we are doing everything right by what the city requires us to do.”

Councilor Harris said: “The most important thing is, the chief needs to take some action against these employees who are violating the public trust.”

Banks said the blame is his.

“Well ultimately, it’s my responsibility when I came on in August,” he said. “My responsibility is to make sure that this entire department is in compliance and at that point is where I failed. And since this being brought to our attention, that has been changed.”

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – A band of public employees stuffing cash in their pockets and they almost got away with it. But one thing they never counted on was a disc. Maybe they just got a little too cocky as thieves. How good were they? Not really, they got caught. Larry Barker has an undercover investigation Tuesday at 10 p.m. on KRQE News 13.

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – Surveillance video obtained by KRQE News 13 shows, irrefutably, that on some occasions, employees were taking money from the BioPark’s cash registers, hiding it under a counter, then slipping it into their wallets later. Read the full story»

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – Something was amiss at the Albuquerque BioPark.

It was December, and staffers at the city’s Cultural Services Department were reviewing some year-end numbers: 1.2 million visitors, $4 million in total revenues.

Something wasn’t adding up.

“Director Betty Rivera over at Cultural Services was looking at reports that listed a combination of revenue and visitors at the Bio Park and noticed some anomalies,” said John Soladay, the city’s chief operations officer.

Surveillance video obtained by KRQE News 13 provides the evidence for the cash drain city officials just couldn’t figure out.

At least three employees hired through a temp agency were stealing cash right out of the BioPark’s cash registers. They weren’t even all that sneaky about it.

The footage shows, irrefutably, that on some occasions, employees were taking money from the registers, hiding it under a counter, then slipping it into their wallets later.

Other snippets of video show employees hiding their thefts behind a sheaf of papers.

In nearly every instance, the employees can be seen scouting the horizon to make sure the coast is clear before they rip off city money.

To catch the thieves, city officials used their contract private eyes, Robert Caswell Investigations.

“We went into the cashiers’ area and installed hidden cameras — like this pinhole camera — over the cash register area,” Bob Casey of RCI said, showing off a camera the size of a nickel.

The cashiers had no idea the city was recording their every move.

In mid-January, RCI pulled the cameras and began the long slog of reviewing the footage.

“The tedious part was having to view the video very slowly to watch and catch … the sleight of hand: movement that would show us that the money was not getting into the cash register,” Casey told KRQE News 13.

The longtime investigator said he didn’t think much of the BioPark thieves. When asked how good they were at grafting city money, he responded: “Not very. They got caught.”

RCI confronted the employees with the video evidence. All three confessed to stealing money. The private eyes turned the case over to City Hall.

The city would not release the temp employees’ names because the case is now the subject of a criminal investigation.

City officials said they don’t know how much money the employees stole or for how long they were stealing.

“Once again I don’t have a good handle on that,” Soladay said. “I can’t even give you a good estimate. It could be a thousand dollars or it could be much more. We simply don’t know.”

Soladay said the temp employees underwent background checks before they came to work at the Bio Park.

“Each of these cashiers, temporary employees, had two background checks, one through (the temp agency) and one through the city,” Soladay said. “Nothing showed in any of those background checks.”

The employees were fired, and the video was turned over to police for the criminal investigation.

“If you steal from us we’re going to fire you and prosecute,” Soladay said. “Pure and simple.”

Jerry Thorndyke wants you to think he’s a businessman.

He’s got a fleet of trucks, a hot-mix spreader, a steel-drum roller and a handful of employees working for his construction company.

Resources

• New Mexico Statutes Chapter 60: Business Licenses Article 13: Construction Industries Licensing
• File a complaint against licensed or unlicensed contractor (pdf)
• Search for public information on a Contractor/LPG Dealer License, Journeyman, or Qualifying Party

Driveways are Thorndyke’s specialty.

But there’s a problem: Thorndyke isn’t much of a driveway man. In reality, he’s little more than a common con man.

One of his recent targets was a Valencia County man named Brian Culp.

“He asked me if I would be interested in having my driveway asphalted,” Culp said in an interview. “He said he had some leftover mix from a previous job and he usually charged $6.50 a square foot, he would give it to me for $2.50 a square foot.”

Here’s how Culp, a retired state employee, described the driveway paving job he paid Thorndyke $9,700 to complete: “This was a hit and run.”

KRQE News 13 approached Thorndyke with a camera rolling to get his reaction to Culp’s characterization of his work: “Get away from me with that,” Thorndyke said.

He told News 13 that he lives in Texarkana but he’s done construction work all over the Land of Enchantment.

“I run a lot of fires like this and do a lot of subcontracting jobs for a guy,” Thorndyke said. “A few years ago, you know where Zunis is? I did all of Zunis two or three years ago. He’s out of business now.”

On a recent afternoon, Thorndyke and his crew spent the afternoon laying asphalt at Culp’s place, then beat a hasty path to the bank to cash Culp’s check.

What was left behind was one heck of a mess. After only a week, the driveway already was falling apart. The specs for residential driveways call for about two-and-half inches of compacted asphalt. The paving at Culp’s place was less than an inch.

“Probably a D minus.” That was the grade Robert Wood, a licensed paving contractor from Albuquerque, gave the work Thorndyke did at Culp’s house.

“They didn’t have any intent in making a professional job,” Wood said. “This was get it done and get that check and get it to the bank. …  It was put down cold. And there was a lot of hand work that was done unnecessarily, and this is what you get. This right here is not going to last.”

But Culp’s driveway wasn’t the end of the road for Thorndyke.

Most fly-by-night contractors would’ve been long gone. Thorndyke was still hanging around. With the lure of doing more paving work, he returned to repair the damage.

“A little cold right here,” he told Culp. “What that is a little cold spot that’s all it is. Just a cold spot. I’ll work it in and see what I can do for you.”

The poor craftsmanship wasn’t the only problem with Thorndyke, though. He also isn’t licensed in New Mexico — a fact that caught the attention of state construction regulators.

Following News 13’s investigation, Thorndyke had walked right into those investigators’ trap.

News 13 was present for this exchange: “We’re investigators for Construction Industries. … Mr. Thorndyke, I don’t know if you know it but in New Mexico it is a criminal violation to contract without a New Mexico contractor’s license. So we have a problem here. First thing is you are going to have to stop this work. You cannot do this work. It is a criminal act to do it.”

Pat McMurray heads up the state’s construction regulatory agency.

“We have 181 cases right now that are being investigated,” McMurray told News 13. “It’s a big problem here in New Mexico because the type of contractor that you are dealing with that’s unlicensed typically is incompetent. … Chances are the contractor has no workmen’s compensation insurance, there’s no bond to protect the homeowner, and so you are just out there … They’re offering a deal that sounds great … but nine times out of 10, it violates code.”

Investigators red-tagged Thorndyke’s work site at Culp’s place, and Thorndyke and his crew packed up for parts unknown. Thorndyke was slapped with two counts of contracting without a license and forced to pay Culp back the $9,700.

Wood summed up the scenario that played out at Culp’s home this way: “Its pretty sad. They come in with high pressure and the homeowner thinks, hey man if I don’t act now I’m going to miss out on this good deal … And this is the hazard. This is what you get.”

By the Numbers

For each hospital in New Mexico, we chart the time, on average, that patients wait in emergency rooms before one of four outcomes: they see a doctor, they get sent home, they’re given pain medications for a broken bone, or they are admitted to the hospital. For each measure, lower numbers are better. Experts caution that very small differences between hospitals for a given measure are unlikely to correspond to noticeable differences in the real world. ER Wait Watcher

For millions of Americans who experience sudden, serious illness or injury every year—and in the increasing scores of communities that must respond to disasters and mass casualty events —immediate access to quality emergency care is essential to saving life and limb. But the availability of that care is threatened by a wide range of factors, including shrinking capacity and an ever-increasing demand for services. Even as more and more Americans come to rely on emergency departments for their acute care needs, particularly aging and sick Boomers and people newly enrolled in Medicaid, such care will increasingly become harder to access.

This national Report Card rates the overall environment in which the emergency care system operates with a near-failing grade of D+. This is a poorer grade than the one earned in 2009, a C-.

These findings are the result of a comprehensive and focused study of the emergency care environment nationwide and state-by-state.

New Mexico

New Mexico continues to struggle with many aspects of the emergency care environment, facing high rates of fatal injuries; health care workforce shortages for specialists, primary care, and other providers; and a Medical Liability Environment that serves as a barrier to recruiting and retaining health care professionals.

Poor Access to Emergency Care has negatively affected the quality of care in New Mexico, resulting in long ED wait times, boarding of patients in the ED, and crowding.

Full Report

• America’s Emergency Care Environment, A State-by-State Report Card (149 page Report)

State by State Comparison (Report Excerpts)

Within each of the letter grades in 2014, many states fall below the average, threatening to drop further if major and immediate improvements are not made. New Mexico’s overall grade is a D.

The national grade for Access to Emergency Care remains a D- as states continue to struggle with a plethora of issues, including health care workforce shortages, shortages of on-call specialists, limited hospital capacity to meet the needs of patients, long emergency department wait times, and increasing financial barriers to care. New Mexico’s Access to Emergency Care grade is an F.

The nation continues to fare best in the Quality and Patient Safety Environment category, as many states have implemented systems and protocols to improve life-saving care and to facilitate effective and efficient systems of care. Despite improvements for a number of states in this category, the nation receives a C overall, representing a slight decline since 2009. New Mexico’s Quality and Patient Safety Environment grade is a D+.

The Medical Liability Environment in the United States is still in crisis and threatens to further diminish the availability of on-call specialists and other providers in states where the risks of lawsuit or costs of liability insurance are prohibitive. The nation again receives a C- for its overall Medical Liability Environment— however, while this indicates that the nation has failed to make progress, it does not mean nothing has changed. New Mexico’s Medical Liability Environment grade is a D-.

The Public Health and Injury Prevention category is unique in that the overall focus is on areas where state systems and initiatives can preemptively have a tremendous impact on improving health outcomes and ultimately reduce the overall need for emergency care. One example of this is immunizations for children and the elderly—reducing the number of people susceptible to contagious disease will ultimately save lives and prevent cases from reaching the emergency department, leaving the health care system available for other emergent needs. New Mexico’s Public Health and Injury Prevention grade is a D+.

While the states overall have continued to improve and refine their disaster preparedness planning and practices, the national grade has fallen slightly to a C-. This is due, in large part, to wide variations across the states in hospital capacity and personnel preparedness. New Mexico’s Disaster Preparedness grade is a D.

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – Six hours.

That’s how long an Albuquerque grandmother waited during a recent visit to the emergency room at a local hospital.

“I got a pain in my chest and it took me to the floor. I could not breathe,” the woman told KRQE News 13.

She was taken to a private hospital by ambulance and put on an IV. “They wheeled me out to the waiting room and I got up and sat in a chair.”

And then the woman waited. And then she waited some more, all the while feeling “rotten.”

I was feeling very bad. Very tired. I was having a little trouble breathing. And I just sit there,” she said.

And then she decided she’d had enough.

“I got up and told them I was going home, take the IVs out, and they talked me into staying some more,” the woman said. “So I stayed there probably another hour, and then I got up and told them to take the IVs out, I’m going home.”

What happened that day was not an isolated incident. In fact, it’s a daily occurrence. Hospital emergency rooms across New Mexico are so overcrowded that patients routinely wait hours to see a doctor. Sometimes the wait can be a half day or more.

Dr. Tony Salazar is President of the New Mexico Chapter of the American College of Emergency Physicians. He put the problem in context.

“The quality of health care is directly related to ER wait times,” Salazar told News 13. “We know that the longer a patient has to wait in the emergency department the increased liklihood of an adverse event for that patient.”

On average, about 240 patients come to the University of New Mexico Hospital ER every day. Dr. Steve McLaughlin chairs the school’s Department of Emergency Medicine.

“We know very directly that the longer patients wait the more likely they are to leave,” he said in an interview.

UNMH shared its internal tracking data of actual ER wait times with News 13. Those figures provided a first ever look at the state’s busiest emergency room, where about 12 percent of the patients who come to the ER each year leave before receiving medical treatment.

For example, 645 patients gave up before being seen by a doctor last August. And for a one-day look, consider April 4, 2013: 56 patients bailed out of the ER that day. And on May 9, 2013, 33 patients left the hospital’s ER without being seen — that’s fully 22 percent of those who came through the door that day.

News 13 asked McLaughlin how that’s possible.

“That’s a great question, and its complicated,” he replied. “I would say really it comes down to the fact that the number of folks that we need to take care of that are showing up and asking for our services is higher than our capacity to take care of those patients.”

It’s not just UNM. Every hospital ER in America wrestles with severe overcrowding.

But the tracking data from UNMH show that patients with injuries like broken bones and abdominal pain waited, on average, less than two hours. On the other side of the coin, some people in that category had to wait as long as 11 hours.

Patients with less severe symptoms — like back pain — waited on average about three hours. But some were in the ER an eye-popping 16 hours.

Inside the Story:

• ER Wait Watcher 
• America’s Emergency Care Environment, A State-by-State Report Card

“I would say its absolutely not what we are striving for,” McLaughlin said. “But it’s reality. It’s the reality given the health care system we are in.”

The reality for private hospitals is equally challenging. For example, Albuquerque’s largest private hospital is Presbyterian.

Presbyterian’s ER sees about 2,000 fewer patients in an average month than UNMH — but that doesn’t necessarily mean shorter wait times.

“A lot of times it comes down to that we have to see the sickest patients first,” said Darren Shafer, medical director for Presbyterian’s ER. “When patients present to triage they are evaluated and its determined whether they are essentially able to safely wait or not … The challenge is we can sometimes have three heart attacks happening at the exact same time in our emergency department and we have to focus on those patients first.”

According to data supplied by Presbyterian, in November, patients with symptoms like chest pains and mental confusion spent, on average, less than two hours in the Presbyterian ER before seeing a doctor, according to data provided by the hospital. And patients with more serious conditions, such as gastrointestinal bleeding, waited about an hour.

But, in November, 88 patients sat for four hours at Presbyterian; 39 waited five hours; and 16 people waited six hours. One patient waited eight hours, and another sat for nine hours. Last year, 1,500 patients left Presbyterian’s emergency room without seeing a doctor.

Officials from the New Mexico Hospital Association — including President Jeff Dye and Chairman Beau Beames — refused News 13’s interview requests for this story.

“Thats really disappointing to hear that patients have come looking for care and they have given up on trying to be seen,” Shafer said. “Presbyterian is actually better than the national benchmark at around one percent in terms of left without being seen. But that being said we are still going to continue to improve. We’re still not going to say that’s acceptable until we don’t have anybody that ever leaves without being seen.

“I don’t think anyone should have to wait. I live in Albuquerque. I was born and raised here. My mother lives here. I don’t want her to come to the emergency department and have to wait. … Nothing is acceptable in terms of a wait time.”

Lovelace Medical Center in Albuquerque declined to share its ER wait time data with News 13. Christus St. Vincent Medical Center in Santa Fe did not respond to News 13’s request.

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – It is a problem investigative reporter Larry Barker first exposed two years ago. Friday night, he will have the conclusion of how the state can waste your money.

See the full investigation on KRQE News 13 at 10.

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – “This particular project,” said Albuquerque Chief Administrative Officer Rob Perry, “is probably a showpiece of government waste.”

State Sen. Pete Campos adds: “This is one of those issues that is unconscionable.”

Campos’ colleague in the Senate, Cisco McSorley, sums it up this way: “Absolutely this is wasted taxpayer money … Theres no explanation for this.”

Two years ago, a KRQE News 13 investigation revealed the secret behind a worn out, ramshackle building. But don’t think of it as just some seedy warehouse. Think of it instead as a half million dollars squandered by the government.

“The taxpayers deserve an apology,” McSorley said.

What’s this all about? Flamenco.

When the the non-profit Flamenco Institute needed a new dance studio, it petitioned the legislature for money. In 2006, lawmakers responded by generously dedicating a half million tax dollars to the cause.

Though the performance space Flamenco wanted wasn’t exactly new, the dance institute thought, once fixed up, that an abandoned, run-down tire and battery warehouse in Downtown Albuquerque would be a perfect place to showcase the Spanish dance form.

Lawmakers can’t use public money to buy buildings for private organizations, like the Flamenco Institute. So legislators appropriated the half million and then handed the cash to the city of Albuquerque. The plan was for the city to buy the empty warehouse and then lease it to the Flamenco folks for $10 a year. In exchange, Flamenco promised free classes for low-income youth, dance demonstrations in Old Town, as well as collaborative programs at APS and UNM.

However well intentioned it sounded as a community arts project, the Flamenco deal was a boondoggle, a classic textbook case: how to waste a half million dollars.

It was only after the city bought the seedy warehouse that anyone bothered looking inside.

No one noticed the decaying walls, the rotting wood floors, the leaky roof, the fire and water damage, the badly cracked concrete walls, or the dangerously precarious support beams. City inspectors found the mechanical, electrical and plumbing systems to be totally inadequate. The entire warehouse was deemed uninhabitable. Because lawmakers only appropriated enough money to buy the building, there wasn’t anything left to fix it.

Because the Flamenco Institute didn’t want to move in to a dilapidated warehouse, the nonprofit simply backed out of the deal, telling the city thanks but no thanks. Just like that, the Spanish dance troupe moved its flashy costumes and spirited music elsewhere, sticking the city of Albuquerque with a useless, half-million-dollar, derelict warehouse.

Due to its total disrepair and lack of any redeeming qualities, the Flamenco dance studio that never was, was demolished last month. News 13’s cameras were there.

As the walls come crumbling down, the final chapter on the legislatures’ $500,000 boondoggle is written in the dust and the rubble.

“This property when it was originally purposed was in substandard condemned condition,” said Perry, the city CAO. “It just became worse and worse, which obviously required the demolition and razing of the property … We have to remove this type of blight and danger from the public community, which we will do. We’ll complete the demolition, we’ll surplus the property and sell it on the open market, returning any of those funds to the state of New Mexico.”

The names of individual lawmakers who sponsored the Flamenco project is a legislative secret.

However, News 13 has learned nine lawmakers and former Gov. Bill Richardson used tax dollars to fund the Flamenco deal. Today, of the five legislators still in office, only McSorley voluntarily came forward to talk about the dead dance deal.

“Somebody along the line didn’t do their due diligence in determining that the property and the money they were spending fit the reason for spending the money in the first place,” he said. “When you appropriate money you expect people not to go out and buy a building that is on the verge of being condemned.”

Senator Campos was not a sponsor of the Flamenco project. However, he has been a long-time advocate for change in how the Legislature spends tax dollars.

“It should not have been funded, and as a result what we have are a half a million dollars that were taxpayer resources that were not used in a proper fashion,” Campos said. “Change needs to happen, and this project is a prime example why that change needs to happen and it needs to happen soon.”

News 13 asked McSorley whether the taxpayers deserve an apology. His reply: “I think theres enough blame to go around to everybody, and I want to make sure that people understand I’m as guilty as anybody. I think the whole system owes taxpayers an apology.”

Campos added: “It’s disheartening. It’s hurtful. Those are resources that could have gone into a child center. They are resources that could have gone into a senior citizens’ center. They are resources that could have gone into a clinic that would provide good healthcare.”

Perry’s assessment: “I think the lesson is to carefully select projects that provide public critical infrastructure needs truly, to fully vet those projects and then ultimately to fully fund them so that we don’t have a pile of rubble and a half million dollars wasted at the end of the day.”

It cost the city of Albuquerque $55,000 to tear the building down and haul debris away. Today, it’s all gone. A single faded sign and an empty lot are all that remain as a costly reminder of New Mexico’s monument to waste.

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – Deputy County Manager Jarvis Middleton says he was “shocked and appalled.”

“I was basically amazed at the audacity of the employee,” the high-ranking Bernalillo County official told KRQE News 13.

Just when you think you’ve seen it all, along comes Bernalillo County Public Works Inspector Kenneth Sanchez. His job is to repair and maintain traffic signals along county roadways.

As a government employee, Ken Sanchez is a real stand out.

But it’s not what you think. You see, Sanchez may have been a very good county inspector, but that’s not what makes him noteworthy.

Sanchez has a hidden talent — as a magician of sorts. And when he performed his mysterious disappearing act, it was a virtuoso performance. Now you see him; now you don’t.

“I was just flabbergasted as to how someone could get away with this,” Middleton said. “It was just amazing to me.”

Sanchez’s little secret unraveled in January.

“We got a tip from a neighbor of Mr. Sanchez that he was basically coming home in the middle of the day and not going back to work,” Middleton said.

Sanchez’s government truck stuck out like a sore thumb sitting in the driveway of his North Valley home day in and day out. So the county’s top brass called in private investigators (Robert Caswell Investigations) to check it out. Armed with hidden cameras and GPS trackers, it only took the PIs a few days to come up with the evidence.

What they found was definitive proof: Ken Sanchez loafed on the job. And if there was an award for doing so, Sanchez would likely go to the head of the class.

News 13 obtained the PIs’ surveillance video through a public records request.

For example: on Jan. 14, at the same time Sanchez claimed to be inspecting a traffic signal in the South Valley, investigators documented his county truck sitting in his driveway across town.

Two days later, by 8:15 a.m., Sanchez was at the county yards. But at 10:50 a.m., he’s back home. Fifteen minutes later he heads to Tijeras to do some repair work for 45 minutes. Next stop? The grocery store. He’s there about 10 minutes and then heads home. Surveillance was called off at 2.30.

On Jan. 17, Sanchez took it easy around the house and didn’t leave for work until 9:30 a.m. But first he needed a bit of an energy boost, so it was time for a mid-morning snack at the Taco Cabana. He was there 25 minutes. At 11:25, he was spotted at a job site repairing a sign. At 12:13 p.m., Sanchez dropped in on a roadside sale for a little browsing. Next, more repair work at Barcelona and Hughes. At 1:24 p.m., he was at a job along Second Street. Twenty minutes later, he did a little shopping at the Pull and Pay on Broadway. He looked around for a half hour, then took a leisurely two-hour lunch at Papa Burgers. Sanchez ended his day at the barbershop just before 4:30 p.m.

• Excerpt: Ken Sanchez Investigative Report»

For another few days, it went on just like that. The investigators had seen enough.

“I would like Mr. Sanchez to know that he’s done a disservice to all of the county employees of Bernalillo County,” Middleton said. “We don’t ask for a lot of praise. All we ask is that we get a fair shake. And when you do these types of things, you endanger that relationship with the public.”

Bernalillo County officials began an investigation. However, before it could be completed, Sanchez retired.

News 13 met with the former inspector. He declined to be interviewed, but said he had already planned to retire before all this happened. Sanchez said he had accumulated overtime hours to compensate for taking off during work. But, he admitted using poor judgment and said: It probably wasn’t right.”

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – An Albuquerque Public Schools board member says the evidence is in, and it’s clear: $1.6 million was wasted by APS.

Here’s the bottom line, as revealed through a KRQE News 13 investigation: APS paid an architect all those tax dollars to design a building that will never be built.

News 13 asked APS Chief Operations Officer Brad Winter whether that was what took place. His reply: “Absolutely right.”

It was supposed to be a state-of-the-art, energy efficient, food and nutrition warehouse. It was to be a massive structure, designed to modernize and consolidate all food preparation and storage for APS, which currently prepares 65,000 meals every day in an old, inefficient and outdated building.

APS assembled a team of the best and brightest to put together a plan for a new food preparation complex. The district even hired an architectural consulting firm to lend a hand.

APS decided to build its new warehouse in the Southeast Heights on land already owned by the district. There would be commercial kitchens, dry storage, cold storage and freezers — all in one building.

In 2008, the school board gave the project a green light and Albuquerque architect Claudio Vigil was hired to design the project. Over the course of the next four years, Vigil produced reams of technical drawings.

Once constructed, the two-story, 108,000-square-foot commercial structure would look something like a digital rendering created for News 13. It would not only be functional, but energy efficient as well. APS announced that the multi-million-dollar complex would open for business in 2011.

That was three years ago.

Today, the building site is still vacant. And the construction project? It never happened. Today, all APS has to show for the expenditure is a table full of architectural drawings.

For perspective: the $1.6 million would have been enough money to fund the operation of Atrisco Elementary School for an entire school year.

News 13 asked Winter whether APS or the architect was at fault for the waste.

“It could be a little bit of both,” he said.

Korte was elected to the school board in 2011.

“APS cannot afford to throw away a penny, either capital or operational monies,” she said. “We can’t afford it.”

How did APS end up literally throwing away all that money?

News 13 has learned the answers: Remember the roomful of experts who planned the building? After carefully computing construction costs, APS directed the architect to design a $12.5 million food and nutrition warehouse. But instead of designing a $12.5 million project, Vigil turned in plans for a $24 million building.

Jaws dropped at APS.

“We have good experts,” Winter said, but he added that, “at the very beginning,” the budget wasn’t realistic.

So APS raised the budget to $20 million and told the architect to try again. However, Vigil’s second set of plans were still millions of dollars over budget.

“It came back at $23 million,” Winter said. “That was still not acceptable to us.”

APS decided to change directions. Officials scrapped plans for a new building and decided that perhaps the old facility wasn’t so bad after all.

APS sent Vigil back to the drawing board for a third time to design a renovation of the existing kitchen and storage warehouse. But that project, too, was doomed.

Just a few months after directing the architect to work up plans for the existing building, APS did a 180-degree turn. Planners decided to buy the old K-mart building on Lomas, renovate it and move all the food preparation and storage to the Heights.

The $1.6 million architectural drawings were tossed aside. Vigil was dismissed, and a new architect was hired.

The K-mart building purchase and renovation will cost taxpayers $11 million.

The way APS figures it, the district actually is saving money: Officials were going to spend $20 million for a new building. However, by spending only $11 million on the K-mart building, taxpayers will realize a $9 million savings.

Call it Fuzzy Math 101.

“We’re still saving $9 million of the taxpayer money instead of building this building,” Winter said. “It took us a little more money, but in the overall end, it saved a lot of money. When you are saving $9 million of the taxpayers money. It’s not a little bit of money, but when we’re saving a lot of money … It was the right thing to do.”

By the time you add it all up, Vigil, the architect, invoiced APS $1.6 million for designs that were never used. What does he have to say about all this? Nothing — he didn’t respond to News 13’s repeated requests for comment.

“I don’t know who’s fault it was,” Winter said. “It could have been everybody — that we were planning a building we weren’t sure of.”

School board member Korte added: “We really we can’t waste a penny. I’ve got schools on the West side that are waiting to be renovated. So $1.6 million that’s lost on this project means $1.6 million less for other projects.”

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – “Yes we did make a mistake,” Lawrence Garcia, the city of Santa Fe’s environmental services director said.

He was stating the obvious.

“I was surprised and disappointed,” newly-elected Santa Fe Mayor Javier Gonzales said. “That led to anger and certainly led to a call for an investigation.”

Gonzales was reacting to an investigation by KRQE News 13.

“We will learn from the mistake and we will not have it happen again,” Garcia said.

Santa Fe is known not only for its unique blend of art, culture and charm, but also as one of the most eco-friendly communities in America. Think “Santa Fe,” and you think “green.” For example: recycling.

“We are trying to be stewards of the environment,” Garcia said. “Our goal is to divert recyclable materials out of the landfill.”

Residents set out recycling in 14-gallon containers. The boxes are collected curbside and delivered to a warehouse for processing. That’s where plastic, tin cans, aluminum, paper and glass are sorted, bundled and then sold to be turned into a new product.

Santa Fe recycles 20 tons of trash every day. Compare that to 150 tons of garbage dumped in the landfill daily.

Some people are skeptical about recycling. They think the city takes carefully sorted newspapers and plastic and then secretly dumps it in the landfill along with the dirty diapers and banana peels. So the success of any community recycling program is dependent on one very simple rule: garbage goes to the landfill, recycling goes to the recycling center.

KRQE News 13 asked Garcia whether the city’s recycle trucks ever go to the landfill.

“Recycle trucks do not go to the landfill,” he said. “The city does not dump recyclable materials. We do not throw recyclable materials away.”

It would be unthinkable for anyone to intentionally discard recycling material in the garbage dump. But that’s exactly what News 13’s investigation found.

On January 6, at 2:40 in the afternoon, truck No. 587 delivered its load to Santa Fe’s Caja Del Rio landfill. The cargo was listed as residential waste, but that was a deception.

(Story Continues Below)

In reality, No 587 only carries recycling material and has no business at the landfill.

But nobody at the city seemed to notice when almost three tons of recyclables were secretly thrown away. Our investigation found it happened again on March 13. Although the trash was shown as residential waste, the city quietly tossed out a ton and a half of recyclables.

“If there was a load that went to the landfill, there had to be reasoning behind it,” Garcia said. “People are human and some people will make a mistake. I believe it was a huge mistake.”

The city cannot explain why the recyclables on January 6 were thrown away, or who authorized it.

According to city officials, on March 13, a solid waste supervisor directed the driver of truck No. 587 to dump all its recycling material in the landfill because, he claims, the load was contaminated with glass.

“I guarantee you that if i would have known about it, it still would not have gone to the landfill,” Garcia said.

Mayor Gonzales added: “It never crossed my mind that there would be a breakdown big enough where you would have a large truck that has writing on it that says recycling on the side of it allowed to go into the landfill.”

“I was disappointed, angry, really wanting to get to the bottom of why there was a breakdown of our system that allowable for recyclable materials to reach the landfill,” Gonzales said. “So there is a period of time that this behavior and this practice was going on that we certainly did not know was happening here at the administration, and furthermore, that there’s material that’s sitting in our landfill that could have been recycled.”

The mayor said there’s now an internal investigation under way.

“We’re trying to identify if discipline is going to be required, and I’m sure it most certainly will, and of course we have to develop — and we are — policies to make sure that doesn’t happen again,” Gonzales said.

Patrick Peck is president of the New Mexico Recycling Coalition.

“We don’t condone dumping recyclable materials in the landfill,” Peck said.

He gave the following as a message to Santa Feans who want to recycle:

“You know what? Have faith. I think the people in Santa Fe are doing the correct thing, They’ve acknowledged it, they are working diligently to correct the problem, so for the citizens of Santa Fe: keep recycling.”

This is not the first time a community has been caught dumping recyclables. A 2007 News 13 investigation found the city of Albuquerque tossing truck loads of recycling in the city landfill.

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – A ton of public money vanished. It wasn’t misplaced or stolen, it was simply squandered.

State legislators would like New Mexicans to believe they appropriate funds for the public good. But, in this case, a lot of cash was simply tossed away and forgotten.

It started with the Edgewood pound, a little storage shed in the village, 33 miles east of Albuquerque. Domestic animals picked up within 50 square miles would be taken to the tiny makeshift animal shelter.

Currently the small building houses wayward cats and a lonely Chihuahua. In another building across the street there are a handful of dogs.

“We just do not have an adequate facility to take care of all the animals,” town administrator Kay Davis McGill said. “We’re constantly running out of space and they are not getting the proper physical care that we should give them.”

In an effort to get a new facility built, former State Representative Kathy McCoy and State Senator Sue Wilson Beffort sponsored a $150,000 legislative appropriation in 2007. The money was to “plan, design and construct” a new animal shelter in Edgewood.

Armed with the legislative money, Edgewood obtained land, hired an architect and began planning for the community’s new animal facility.

Architect Jonathon Craig was directed to design a state of the art animal shelter that could accommodate not only stray animals from Edgewood, but the entire east mountain area as well.

Craig produced conceptual drawings and a master plan that would cost Edgewood $10 million.

That was six years ago. However, no matter how hard you look you won’t find the animal shelter. In fact, it never got built.

With only $150,000 to pay the architect, Edgewood had no choice but to pull the plug on the legislative funded project.

Now retired, former State Representative McCoy admits there is nothing to show for the $150,000 appropriation.

When asked is it fair to say all that money appropriated by the legislature for this project was simply wasted, McCoy responded “I would have to agree on that.” McCoy acknowledged, at the time of the legislative project, she really didn’t know how much a new animal shelter would cost.

“I didn’t have the faintest idea. And admittedly I probably should have,” McCoy said.

Today all the drawings and plans for the building that should have been but never was, have been boxed up and taken to an offsite storage locker. There they will sit gathering dust until sometime in the future when the box will be tossed in the trash.

ALBUQUREQUE (KRQE) – Something strange is going on in Santa Fe’s upscale Guadalupe District. It is an area known for unique shops and distinctive restaurants, and just off a side street, there is a parking lot frequented by dozens of mysterious strangers.

They park there, nonchalantly stroll towards a cinder block wall and then discretely disappear.

All day long, cars are abandoned as drivers vanish over the wall. Later, returning from some unknown mission, they hop the wall, slip back in their cars and vanish.

These curious wall jumpers are not on some secret mission, they are just restaurant employees going to work at the Cowgirl BBQ. And when they park in the lot, they are in violation of state policy and regulation.

The parking lot is now at the heart of a state government scandal arranged by Larry Campos, the head of the New Mexico Workforce Connection office in Santa Fe. Campos improperly allowed a private business free use of government property.

When asked if an employee can give a private benefit that nobody else in the public gets, Campos replied “Oh that’s not true. That’s not true. I don’t have the authority to do that.”

Parking is limited in the historic Santa Fe area along Guadalupe Street. And while the parking lot is just across the street, it’s strictly off limits.

“Those parking lots are for our state business and state customers only,” Workforce Solutions Cabinet Secretary, Celina Bussey said.

To keep drivers out, the lot is enforced with sternly worded signs and a security guard patrolling the area. However, the security guard said only Cowgirl restaurant employees are allowed to park in the area.

KRQE News 13 documented more than two dozen employees parking in the lot.

It’s a secret deal allowing Cowgirl employee’s free, unlimited, exclusive use of state property. Some restaurant employees use Cowgirl stickers on the dash as identification. Other employees are provided forged state parking permits from the security guard, so that their cars are left alone.

Everyone else risks getting towed.

“State employees really do not have any authority to pick and choose which private contractors may use public facilities,” New Mexico General Services Department Cabinet Secretary Ed Burckle said. “That would be outside their authority.”

“We’ve asked all of our staff to understand that under no circumstances is it appropriate for those type of parking arrangements to be made,” Bussey said.

Campos admits it was a bad decision.

“Maybe in this case it was bad judgment…maybe I stepped on the wrong … did the wrong thing. I admit it,” Campos said.

“Parking lots as well as buildings are for state purposes only, and any prior decisions that have been made to do anything contrary to that need to be corrected because they are not in accordance with our policy,” Bussey said.

So, what is in it for Campos?

A confidential source told KRQE News 13 the high ranking state employee bragged about free and discounted food.

Cowgirl restaurant owner Nick Ballas told KRQE News 13 the restaurant does not provide any incentive or compensation to Campos in exchange for the free employee parking. He said Cowgirl does routinely provide discounts to everyone in the area, but says that is just being neighborly.

Workforce Solutions said it would issue official parking permits only to employees and customers. The forged placards would also be null and void.

“The direction will be to communicate with the owner of that restaurant that regardless of any prior decisions or directives that they’ve been given their employees or customers have access to the parking lot, that for normal business hours and for the purposes of state business, that is the only access the parking lot will be afforded,” Bussey said.

Although Secretary Bussey said the improper parking arrangement would be halted immediately, it wasn’t. As of last Friday, state officials put up new signs limiting parking to official business only. However, Cowgirl employees continued to park in the lot.

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – The Albuquerque Airport is ground zero for a scheme so unusual it sparked a major investigation.

“Sure it’s a big deal,” Albuquerque Aviation Director Jim Hinde said.

According to investigators, airport electricians James Lunsford, Rocky Medina, Ronnie Padilla and Jason Pettis took part in a sophisticated scheme to make big bucks by stealing city property.

“Shock… Absolute shock,” Hinde said. “Anytime the city is losing money because of apparently illegal activity it’s a big deal that needs to be addressed.”

The key to this investigation is a treasure hunt of sorts and you have to follow the clues. But don’t bother looking in all the obvious places. You won’t find anything at baggage claim or in the concourse. You can also forget about looking in all those planes, taking off and landing.

The clues to this modern day treasure hunt leads to Runway 17/35. The once busy stretch of pavement was permanently closed to air traffic two years ago, leaving the runway inactive. Just below the surface is a “pot of gold” of sorts.

Underneath the runway were miles of wiring controlling all the air field electronics and lighting. When Runway 17/35 was decommissioned in 2012, all the wiring was pulled out and stockpiled at a nearby warehouse.

Faced with a stockpile of old runway wire gathering dust, airport managers told the staff to get rid of it. City regulations require surplus property be offered for sale at a public auction.

• Albuquerque’s Public Surplus® web-auction site

The wiring was offered for sale on Albuquerque’s online public auction site where it was photographed and simply described as ‘scrap wire #8′ with a value of $250. No quantity was listed.

It was sold at the end of the two week online auction for $2,100. The high bidder was airport electrician James Lunsford.

Lunsford took the 8,900 pounds of scrap copper wire to Pueblo Metals Recycling and was paid $16,000. He then split the profits with Padilla, Medina and Pettis.

Anyone who participated in the auction would have thought they were bidding on a pallet of scrap wire worth just a few hundred bucks. However, only the airport employees knew the city was actually auctioning off four and half tons of copper core scrap.

Investigators allege the employees rigged the auction so they could grab the valuable wire for themselves. Before surplus city property can be sold at auction it must first be approved by an airport manager.

“I had signed off on the surplus form that showed scrap wire,” Aviation Director Hinde said. “I was not aware they were auctioning off four tons of wire.”

When asked if it was accurate to put the fair market value of the wire at $250, Hinde said it was “not accurate at all.” He also said that the people who approved the sale would have never seen what was out there.

“There is some trust factor you have to have on the approval process on these forms,” Hinde said.

Pueblo Metals Recycling was not so trusting. Because it’s not every day that someone comes in off the street wanting to sell four tons of copper wire, Pueblo Metals checked with airport maintenance manager Chuck Brice to verify Lunsford’s story that he had legitimately purchased the wire from the airport. Brice told Pueblo Metals everything was fine, no problem.

“I don’t think Chuck either was aware of the misrepresentation as to the amount of wire that was involved in the transaction,” Hinde said. “I believe there were some management mistakes made.”

Shortly after the wire auction, the airport auctioned off surplus runway signs. Aviation electrician Rocky Medina drew up the paperwork and listed the sign’s value as $200. Brice and Hinde approved the deal. And once again, Lunsford was the high bidder and bought the signs for $640.

Lunsford took his purchase to Earth Day Recycling and was paid almost $2,000. Again, the airport gang of four divvied up the profit.

This time Brice ordered an investigation. However, the 2012 probe was concluded with a verbal reprimand and Brice dropped the matter.

Two years later an airport whistleblower came forward and blew the lid off the questionable auctions. Disciplinary proceedings have been initiated against Brice.

Earlier this year, the private investigative firm of Robert Caswell Investigations was called in. The firm’s internal investigation was completed earlier this month.

As a result of the city investigation, disciplinary proceedings have been initiated against airport electricians Rocky Medina and Jason Pettis.

Ronnie Padilla transferred to the Water Authority and is no longer a city employee.

James Lunsford retired in May. The former airport electrician told News 13, he never tried to hide a thing.

“We were just trying to, just like anybody else, purchase something , see if we could make a little extra money but as far as us thinking we did something wrong? No. We would never have done that. And that’s the god’s truth,” Lunsford said.

An Albuquerque administrator told News 13 it is currently not against regulations for city employees to bid on items offered in city auctions. However, he says, this case is being referred to the Albuquerque Police Department for a criminal investigation.