TWO THEORIES
As juvenile justice reforms sweep the nation—and a high-stakes trial in Santa Fe approaches—SFR explores the systems in New Mexico
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JUNE 16-22, 2021
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SFREPORTER.COM
Fall trial in killing of basketball standout spotlights myriad legal issues, including self defense and juvenile justice reform
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BY JEFF PROCTOR
urors must answer a host of thorny, charged questions in a First Judicial District courtroom come October; whether Estevan Montoya fired the shot that killed Santa Fe High basketball star Fedonta “JB” White won’t be among them. Montoya, 16, and White, 18, found their way to the same underage drinking party in Chupadero on Aug. 1. The younger of the two shot a single bullet that struck the blue chip hoops recruit, who was likely on his way to the starting lineup for the University of New Mexico Lobos—an act that in a split-second led to impassioned calls for harsh punishment, pleas for understanding and a divided community. None of that’s in doubt. Even Dan Marlowe, Montoya’s lawyer, concedes his young client, now 17, pulled the trigger. But that’s where the agreement stops. District Attorney Mary CarmackAltwies says it was first-degree murder, committed by a gang member with a history that was pointing toward a heinous crime. “We’re going to trial, and we’re pursuing the maximum sentence,” CarmackAltwies tells SFR in her first public comments about the killing. Marlowe says White was chasing Montoya, who was armed because he’d watched a close friend die by gunfire just two weeks earlier, and his client fired in self defense. Further, the longtime criminal defense attorney says, the boy is a member of a rap group known as the Southside Goons, which is no gang. “He didn’t mean to kill that kid. He didn’t even know he was gonna hit him,” Marlowe says in an interview. “He just shot to scare him. And then the kid dies....I believe that it’s absolutely preposterous that they would be charging him with first-degree murder. It is all political, and there’s no way around it.” Montoya has pleaded not guilty to charges of first-degree murder, evidence tampering, negligent use of a firearm and unlawful carrying of a firearm. Jury selection is set to begin in Santa Fe Oct. 4, with First Judicial District Judge T. Glenn Ellington presiding. The trial will take place against a thick, emotional backdrop, which for nearly a year has sometimes boiled into anger among friends and supporters of both boys on social media
and in the comments sections of news stories about the case. Additionally, it’ll be an early, highstakes test for Carmack-Altwies, a newly minted, first-time prosecutor who ran on a platform of progressive change in the criminal justice system, particularly shifting resources and energy “away from punishment and toward rehabilitation.” Juvenile justice reform has been ascendant nationwide—and in New Mexico—in recent years, with US Supreme Court rulings that recognize people under 18 make decisions differently than adults. The rulings paved the way for more leniency, even in the most serious cases, and in this state, for proposals to change the sentencing and parole schemes for those who committed crimes as children. (See SFR’s story on the reforms on page 13.) Carmack-Altwies was a vocal supporter of such a reform bill that nearly crossed the finish line during this year’s legislative session. However, she says, the job of a prosecutor requires a different calculus. “We have to treat them the same-ish for these most serious crimes,” CarmackAltwies says. “But we have to take into account that down the line, they’re going to grow and develop more and change more than a 32-year-old man that commits a heinous first-degree murder.” The seriousness of the crime Marco Serna, Carmack-Altwies’ predecessor at the DA’s Office, made the decision almost immediately after Montoya’s arrest to charge the boy as an adult. Serna could have chosen a different tack by setting up an amenability hearing—a process through which a judge decides whether the accused youth is open enough to treatment to be released at 21 years old. The other path: adult sanctions, which could lead to a sentence of 30 years to life in a state prison. “We definitely explored it,” CarmackAltwies says of whether Montoya should have been eligible for an amenability hearing. “Ultimately we rejected that based on factors I can’t disclose—both in the pending case and Montoya’s history.” She decided Serna made the right call. “When I came into office, I went through every pending homicide with my attorneys who were assigned to those cases, and we made decisions about every single one to see: Should this prosecution continue?” she says. “Should this be charged at a higher level? Should this be charged at a lower level? This was one where I thought the prosecution was spot-on.” Asked for details about what, specifically, in Montoya’s background convinced her
