The City of Santa Fe released additional audio from the Eldorado Hotel on December 13 involving Gov. Susana Martinez.
The audio released came from Sergeant Anthony Tapia’s belt loop recorder and features a security guard, who says he is called a security agent, speaking to the governor about the complaints.
Joey Peters
The Eldorado Hotel in Santa Fe.
A security agent, speaking to the police sergeant, says it is his first time dealing with such a situation in the month and a half he worked there.
“I never expected the first time it would be the governor,” the security agent said.
“I can tell she is…”
“Inebriated,” the officer finishes.
“Yes,” the security guard says.
The security agent added that he didn’t think there was just six people in Martinez’ room, but rather “quite a few” people.
Martinez insists there is no loud noise in the room and says while there were bottles being thrown earlier in the night, it was before she was in the room. Following the news of the initial phone calls, Martinez insisted there were snowballs being thrown in interviews with other media outlets.
NM Political Report reached out to a spokesman for the governor on Tuesday morning and will add any response we receive.
“I’ve been up there two hours ago and it was empty,” Martinez said in the audio. “Empty. No one was in that room. We finished downstairs at midnight at your ballroom. It’s been empty. Five hours ago, there was somebody that we said ‘get out of the room, do not be doing what you’re doing’ and there were bottles that were being thrown over. We said, ‘Get the hell out,’ and ‘stop.’”
Martinez also added that nobody was throwing bottles from the balcony anymore.
“Well, I think this more recent complaint is just about the noise in general,” the security agent said.
“Like a radio?” Martinez responded.
At that point in the recording, people start talking over each other and it’s hard to distinguish what is being said.
Soon, Martinez pointed to a woman in hallway.
“Who’s the woman out in the hallway, on her computer and not in her room?” Martinez asked.
“I guess she couldn’t sleep, and she’s a guest,” the security agent answered.
In previous recordings, Martinez, at least 11 times, demanded that authorities give her identity of the person who complained against her room. She also said that if bottles being from in the room, it was at least six hours before she arrived and the person was no longer there.
In previous recordings, she said that if there were bottles being thrown, it was hours before she arrived and the person was no longer there.
The previous recordings came from phone calls to police.
The security agent said that he was up in the hallway about fifteen minutes before and “personally heard how loud it was.” He is also heard saying he thinks that more than six people, as Martinez stated, were in the room.
He later told the officer that he was there when pizza arrived and that the music was turned down at that point.
“We can’t really get them to leave. We don’t know what to do,” the security agent says. He says that he didn’t know who was in there and he believed there were more than six people.
The officer says that if there are any other problems to call him, with a card he handed to the security agent, and he would try to get in touch with the security detail.
“Obviously it’s not going to be a…” the officer said.
“Easy process,” the security agent finished.
“Yeah,” the officer says and then sighs. “Well, I think it’s resolved for at least a little bit.”
The city of Santa Fe said they released the audio after several public records requests. NM Political Report had asked about the existence of belt loop audio.
Note: This is a breaking news story and information may be added.
Previous Susana Martinez stories:
- Guv responds to reports of hotel party, phone calls
- Governor’s party was almost $8,000 in public funds
- GOP governors choose Martinez to lead RGA
- Gov confirms FBI spoke to her, staff about investigations
- Report: FBI looking into Tax and Rev audits
- Governor to leap out of plane for campaign cash
Update 1: Added more quotes from the audio, regarding the music and woman in the hallway.
Update 2: Added information about security agent talking about the number of people in the room.
Correction: The story originally identified the police sergeant as “Michael Tapia” but he goes by “Anthony Tapia.” We regret the error.
