http://nmindepth.com/2016/12/08/feds-confirm-investigation-of-apd-body-cam-allegations/

This should run up someone’s laundry bill.

The story says “a rare public confirmation of a federal criminal investigation”.

At last, an independent investigation by a federal law enforcement agency and an investigation not conducted by someone selected and bought and paid for by city hall.

Some of the most disturbing portions of this report are:

“[R]records obtained and reviewed … suggest that officers have broad powers to change and delete video — and have done so. In a sworn, videotaped deposition, APD Detective Frank Pezzano testified in October that he altered video from officers’ body cameras and other sources such as surveillance cameras, including in the Hawkes shooting case.
Pezzano also revealed that he and others have used several software programs apart from the department’s cloud-based video storage system to manipulate video.

Also, documents obtained by NMID from a source show that dozens of APD employees, including Pezzano, handled videos inside the cloud from the April 2014 morning when then-officer Jeremy Dear shot Hawkes. The employees watched the videos, made copies of them and, in some cases, edited portions of the footage.” (Reporter Jeff Proctor, New Mexico Political In Depth article “Feds Confirm Investigation of APD Body Cam Allegations)

Now let’s see if the federal investigation goes all the way to include investigating the allegations that top APD command staff and the City Attorney’s Office ordered the altering, tampering or withholding of video camera evidence in civil cases.