Mountainair Police Chief Seems Free to Rule as He Pleases

James Freeman has shone a light on allegations of police misconduct and abuse of power in Mountainair for months. Many of us looked on assuming the Attorney General would intervene if Mayor Peter Nieto failed to act. Instead, the situation escalated by the week. The Mountainair Police Chief seems free to rule as he pleases.

However, Freeman recently uncovered what might be the underlying reason for an emboldened police chief who protects officers of the Mountainair Police Department accused of using excessive force on the people. Freeman revealed that ten months after a whistleblower came forward to the AG with explosive evidence, a response by the AG is not apparent. While the public awaits a response from the AG, Freeman reports alleged retaliation by the Mayor and Police Chief Juan Reyes. The Mayor and Police Chief possibly understand the Attorney General will not ride to the rescue of the people in Mountainair.

Editor, Estancia News

Following is a transcript of Freeman’s exposé on the deteriorating situation:

[00:00:00.250] – Kim Vallez, KRQE News 13

A New Mexico police officer is accused of breaking into his chief’s office and meddling with evidence. News 13’s Natalie Wadas looked into the case today. Natalie.

[00:00:09.260] – James Freeman

But Natalie Wadas didn’t look into the case at all. She simply regurgitated what a corrupt police chief and mayor told her. Had she actually looked into it, she would have discovered that what she’s watching here is a police officer in a department that’s so corrupt that even he decided it was time to blow the whistle on it. What you’re actually watching here is an officer gathering evidence against his own chief of police and fellow officers and submitting complaints to the attorney general as well as other outside law enforcement agencies in New Mexico.

In previous videos, we’ve shown you the corruption and abuse within the Mountainair Police Department. But today we show you that before myself or anyone else started publicly covering this, there was a whistleblower inside of the department that was working diligently to preserve evidence of possible misconduct and crimes within the police department.

When Chief Juan Reyes, Mayor Peter Nieto discovered what Officer Mike Shumate was doing, they immediately retaliated against him. They took this surveillance video from inside of the police department that shows officer Michael Shumate downloading videos onto a flash drive and making copies of documents to be sent to state and county officials and claimed that it showed Shumate tampering with evidence.

But under New Mexico state statute 30-22-5, tampering with evidence means that you are destroying or trying to change evidence in order to try to prevent someone from being prosecuted or convicted under the law. And guys, you can’t make this up. In his report, Chief Reyes claimed that Mike Shumate used a paper book as a pry tool against the locked door to get into the chief’s office.

The council members anxiously awaited seeing this part of the video where this officer, like a MacGyver, uses paper to pry open a door. But that part of the video never came. When council members anxiously asked Chief Reyes where’s the part of the video where he pries opened a door with a notebook, the chief exclaims that, that particular part of the video did not record.

Chief Reyes later changed his story to simply say that Mike Shumate entered the office without permission. But other officers claimed that the chief’s office was never considered off limits, and officers were allowed to go in and out as they needed. But what Michael Shumate was doing was quite literally the exact opposite of that. He was preserving what he believed to be possible misconduct and even possible crimes in order to send them to higher government agencies to be reviewed and investigated.

As you can see, the date on this surveillance video where Shumate is accused of tampering with evidence is October 31, 2021. Just days later, on November 7, 2021, records show that he’s filed official complaints with the state of New Mexico Office of the Attorney General. This particular complaint alleges improper use of the NCIC system as well as rights violations, and excessive force allegedly used by Officer Woodard, Sergeant Neville Bernard, and Chief Juan Reyes.

In the complaint, Shumate lets the Attorney General know that there’s lapel footage of the incidents that he’s claiming occurred. There were three other complaints sent to the Attorney General between the 7th and the 15th, all alleging misconduct and or crimes committed by fellow officers and the chief, claiming that all of his allegations were verifiable by body cam footage. Footage that he personally made sure would be preserved so that it could not be deleted by fellow officers and the chief.

But somehow Chief Juan Reyes was tipped off that Shumate was blowing the whistle on him and his officers. The chief reviewed the surveillance footage, and sure enough found his officer preserving evidence against him. The mayor and Chief of Police brought this video before Town Council and told Council that it showed Shumate entering the chief’s office without permission and downloading videos without permission.

But the chief’s office was never locked and it was open to all the officers to go in and out as they needed. And there is no law or policies stating that Shumate wasn’t allowed to download videos that he had legal access to. The council voted on whether or not to terminate Shumate, but they were unable to reach an agreement to terminate Shumate, as a couple of the council members claimed that they didn’t see any policy or law violations in the video.

Shumate should have been returned to work following the vote, but Juan Reyes and Peter Nieto refused to allow Shumate to return. He’s been on paid administrative leave ever since November. But this goes much deeper. Shumate wasn’t the only one blowing the whistle on Reyes at this time. Reyes was under investigation for alleged sexual harassment against another town employee as well as two citizens.

When complaints made to Mayor Peter Nieto weren’t getting anywhere, the allegations were brought up in public meetings. Peter Nieto continued to try to brush it off, but Councilman Ernie Lopez insisted that it needed to be investigated by an outside agency, recommending that the State Police take over the investigation. Nieto convinced the council members that it should be conducted by a private investigator. Town and council voted and agreed to pay Mesilla Valley Investigations to look into the allegations against the chief.

Based on the correspondence between Mayor Peter Nieto and the investigator that was forwarded to me, it appeared that Peter Nieto was trying to interfere with the investigation. Before the investigation even began, the investigator informed the town clerk, Dennis Fulfer, that he had received allegations against the chief, a sergeant and the mayor, Peter Nieto. He stated that because of this, his contact with the town would need to be someone other than these three people that are under investigation. The investigator was told that he only had permission to investigate the chief and that if he did investigate the mayor, he would not be paid for his work.

Peter continually asked for updates on how the investigation was going, and when the investigator informed him that there were two women who had come forward and claimed that the police chief touched them inappropriately, Nieto responded immediately, dismissing the claims; also wanting to know the identities of the alleged victims and how the investigator ended up coming into contact with these alleged victims.

During his investigation, it became clear that there was far more going on within this department than just the allegations made against the chief. The investigator reached out to Mayor Peter Nieto, believing that the mayor would encourage any investigation into his officers of alleged misconduct. But when the investigator told Nieto that there was likely far more going on within this department than he was initially told, Peter became defensive and ordered the investigator to stop the investigation. Nieto’s email to the investigator reads:

“Good evening, Ricky, I would like to get this investigation closed out and billed out. When you emailed that you received information about, quote, one of your police officers, that is clear indication that it has nothing to do with the four complaints we hired you to investigate. I would assume if it was about Chief Reyes, you would have said that the four complaints all had to do with Chief Reyes. We hired your firm for those four complaints.

As far as the information you received, you can do what you need with it on your own time. You mentioned you are not giving me any information and would only give it to law enforcement. I strongly believe that this is wrong. My police officer has every right to defend themselves. The town of Mountainair, for which I am the Chief Executive officer, has every right to defend itself. I do want to make you aware that I will be forwarding all emails from your agency to our town attorney for review.

The new information you are referencing is also a clear indication that you are speaking to other individuals that have nothing to do with this investigation and it seems even letting them dictate this investigation, that is something that is my responsibility. I’m unsure if this includes Mountainair Town Council persons or not. However, the fact that you are collecting information not having to do with the four complaints we provided to you to investigate is quite concerning and seems to imply to me that you are clearly overstepping.

From the very beginning, it was indicated to you that I would be the contact for the town of Mountainair and that no other person, including Town Council persons, would be able to get information regarding this investigation without getting it from me, through your final report.”

No proper investigation of the Chief of Police, Officers, Sergeant, or the Mayor has ever been done because Mayor Peter Nieto has blocked it and never allowed it. He bullied the investigator, telling him that he would dictate the investigation even though he was supposed to be one of the subjects of the investigation. After the council refused to fire whistleblower Michael Shumate, Juan Reyes, who Shumate was trying to blow the whistle on, filed a complaint with the Law enforcement Academy Board to try to have Shumate’s badge taken so that he can’t be a law enforcement officer anywhere in the state of New Mexico.

On June 21, 2022, at the town council meeting, Councilor Richard Torres asked Mayor Peter Nieto why Officer Shumate wasn’t brought back to work after they voted not to terminate him. Peter Nieto repeatedly claimed that one cannot be an active officer at Mountainair Police Department while they have a pending “LEA 90” complaint against them.

[00:09:28.710] – Councilor Richard Torres

Okay, that night, after nothing would happen, I think that night you should have actually put him back to work because we were supposed to get rid of him. He was already a town employee. We were here to get rid of him. We didn’t get rid of him that night. So I think that night you should actually told him, okay, start tomorrow, come back to work, and then go from there. But you guys never appointed him back.

[00:09:49.820] – Mayor Peter Nieto

I just told you that he cannot be a police officer in the town of Mountainair if he has a “LEA 90” pending in the Law Enforcement Academy, he has a LEA 90 pending, which means he cannot be a police officer here. I decided..

[00:10:04.130] – member of public

That’s a good one.

[00:10:05.630] – Councilor Richard Torres

But that night that we voted, that was the vote for was to get rid of him, right?

[00:10:09.070] – Mayor Peter Nieto

Correct.

[00:10:09.480] – Councilor Richard Torres

That means he was still an officer here, right?

[00:10:11.640] – Mayor Peter Nieto

Well, he had a pending, he had a pending LEA 90 on him. He cannot be a cop.

[00:10:19.330] – Councilor Richard Torres

So now in reality, if he’s pending why did we even have to bring it to a vote until..

[00:10:23.570] – Mayor Peter Nieto

Because we were bringing it to a vote to terminate.

[00:10:26.010] – Councilor Richard Torres

Yeah, but since we did, I think we should have put him back to work that next day.

[00:10:30.130] – member of public

Can you tell everyone what an LEA 90 is?

[00:10:33.650] – Mayor Peter Nieto

Lea 90 is a complaint to the Law Enforcement Board about a police officer.

[00:10:38.040] – member of public

To try to revoke their certification, is that right?

[00:10:41.201] – Mayor Peter Nieto

Yes

[00:10:41.930] – Councilor Richard Torres

But anyway, my opinion was that after that night, we didn’t approve to get rid of him. That means he’s still an officer. I thought we should have brought him.

[00:10:50.880] – Mayor Peter Nieto

We cannot bring him back as a cop because he has a pending LEA 90. Okay.

[00:10:56.870] – Councilor Richard Torres

Mayor, I do have more…

[00:10:58.520] – James Freeman

In case you’re wondering. We have not been able to find any such policy in Mountainair. It certainly appears that Peter Nieto flat out lied to City Council and to the public and his constituents. It would appear that Peter Nieto single handedly went against the will of the council and the governing body, refusing to allow Shumate to work, even though the council had not voted to get rid of him.

But we still have multiple people who had complaints against the chief that tried to go to the mayor, who never had their issues properly looked into or investigated, because the mayor blocked it at every turn. Most of these people had given up. But it was these words from Peter at this meeting that made these people realize that maybe there was another avenue and someone else to look into their complaints.

Since this meeting, three LEA 90 complaints have been filed against Chief Juan Reyes. As you all heard Peter adamantly stress multiple times, one cannot be a police officer at Mountainair Police Department with a pending LEA 90 complaint. Councilman Ernie Lopez was informed by the LEA board that they had received at least one of these complaints. He requested to be put on the agenda to vote to have the chief put on administrative leave due to the fact that he now has a pending LEA 90.

[00:12:15.000] – Mayor Peter Nieto

I just told you that he cannot be a police officer in the town of Mountainair if he had a LEA 90 pending in the Law Enforcement Academy.

[00:12:22.830] – James Freeman

Mayor Peter Nieto refused to put it on the agenda. Councilman Ernie Lopez, over the last eight months to a year, has repeatedly tried to put things on the agenda that Peter Nieto has blocked, including trying to vote to get rid of Officer Woodward when he was repeatedly battering people and breaking into homes illegally. But Peter Nieto has a history of consistently protecting the bad cops within his department and refusing to even put it on the agenda to even talk about such items. At the same time, he has single handedly decided to remove the one good whistleblowing cop from the department against the will of the governing body.

Time came for the meeting and once again Peter has decided the entire agenda and refused to talk about putting the chief on leave. He changes the rules every meeting to suit his current mood, run things like a dictator, and refuses to allow anyone to hold him or his tyrant cops accountable. Well, this time the people have had enough.

[00:13:22.130] – James Freeman

Hey, Peter. This meeting is not going to continue. This meeting isn’t going to continue, Peter. You’re going to start listening to the people. Peter.

[00:13:37.530] – James Freeman

We informed all the surrounding law enforcement agencies of what we intended to do before we did it. We informed them that we may be breaking some rules like when someone sits in the front of the bus when they’re supposed to sit in the back, but that our demonstration would be 100% peaceful with zero violence and zero destruction of property.

[00:13:59.050] – member of public

Will our representatives bring things to the table? Let them represent their constituents, Peter. Roll your eyes you little socialist pig.

[00:14:09.290] – James Freeman

Peter would either allow the governing body counselors to represent their constituents or it may get a little too noisy in there for the Peter Nieto show to go on. But guys, the most important part of this video that I want to point out is Officer Michael Shumate. He’s still on paid administrative leave and still has an active LEA 90 complaint against him for trying to blow the whistle on Woodard and Reyes, and have them investigated by the state before any of us even knew what was going on or were showing these videos on YouTube.

Guys, this is what people like me have been asking law enforcement officers across the nation to do. When you see cops acting up and abusing people, stop protecting them. Michael Shumate did exactly what we the people expected him to do and now his career is on the line. Please reach out to the New Mexico Governor’s office during this election season and ask that they move in and do the proper investigation on Juan Reyes, Officer Woodard, Sergeant Neville Bernard and Mayor Peter Nieto.

Officer Shumate is by every definition of the word a whistleblower, and should be protected by both state and federal whistleblowing laws. Everything that Juan Reyes and Peter Nieto have done to Shumate is direct retaliation for Shumate complaining to the Attorney General about rights violations by the Mountainair Police Department. Please be respectful when contacting the New Mexico Governor’s office to ask them to investigate the Mountainair New Mexico Police Chief and Mayor and ask them to please apply the necessary protections for whistleblower Mike Shumate.