A new law that provides opportunity for adults who were sentenced as children to decades in prison to have a parole hearing after a certain length of time, depending on the severity of the crime, has inadvertently led to some disagreement over public records requests. The New Mexico Department of Corrections, the New Mexico Parole Board and legal advocates presented to the interim Courts, Corrections and Justice Committee on Friday to discuss the implementation of SB 64, sponsored by state Sen. Antoinette Sedillo Lopez, D-Albuquerque. SB 64, No Life Sentence for Juveniles, eliminated the possibility of a life sentence for a juvenile convicted in a violent crime and also allowed for juveniles convicted in violent crimes to a parole hearing after 15, 20, or 25 years in prison depending on the crime’s severity.
The bill, passed this year and signed by Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, went into effect on July 1. Department of Corrections General Counsel Mark Lovato told the committee that the department received an Inspection of Public Records Act request in February from the American Civil Liberties Union of New Mexico for the files on the 30 inmates the bill would retroactively effect immediately if enacted. Lovato said the request for the files amounted to nearly 26,000 pages of documents which required substantial administrative hours redacting sensitive information under IPRA statute.