BLOG CHANGES, ETC.

I just rearranged my links on the right side of the blog to include a new section on some of my favorite New Mexico music sites. It's not intended to be complete. And if you're looking for an individual band or singer, try the state Music Commission's directory or The New Mexican's music directory. The links are right there.

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In another change, I've decided to go back to Haloscan for my comments here due to problems described at the bottom of in the "Mystic Judicial Dwarves" post below.

All new posts will have Haloscan comments. Unfortunately it seems that I can't disable the Blogger comments without hiding the existing comments. So the old posts will have two comment links. So use the one that says "Comment," not the one that says "Post a Comment." (Is that confusing enough?)

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Here's a link to my story in today's New Mexican about another Robert Vigil relative in the state Treasurer's Office who was fired only to find another government job.

ROUNDHOUSE ROUNDUP: A RICH HISTORY OF CORRUPTION

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
August 24, 2006

Listening to recent New Mexico political ads and blogosphere chatter — with all the reports of kickbacks, cronyism and special favors for campaign contributors — one might think we’re living in the sleaziest era of corruption in the history of the state.

Not even close.

A recently published book about a murder near Las Cruces 57 years ago is a sobering reminder that political corruption is nothing new here. In fact, this state has a rich tradition of official corruption and chicanery.

In many ways, the current crop of scoundrels are amateurs compared with the cast of characters in Peter R. Sandman’s Murder Near the Crosses.

This is a nonfiction account of the infamous Cricket Coogler case, the slaying of an 18-year-old Las Cruces waitress/”party girl” written by the son of a sheriff’s deputy who was part of the investigation.

As also documented in Charlie Cullin’s 2002 film The Silence of Cricket Coogler, the Coogler case wasn’t just a run-of-the-mill sex murder. A maverick grand-jury investigation and the work of a brave reporter named Walter Finley revealed the victim was a playmate of high-level politicians who frequented illegal Mafia-run gambling joints.

In the first chapter, Sandman, relying on FBI records received through the Freedom of Information Act and papers from a judge involved in the grand jury investigation, says the Cleveland mob and gangsters from Los Angeles were involved in New Mexico gambling. While the federal government never prosecuted any of the Mafia gambling interests in New Mexico, apparently the FBI kept tabs on the operations.

In Doña Ana County, Sandman wrote, Mafiosi made direct payments to Sheriff “Happy” Apodaca, a judge and a state corporation commissioner, who divided his share among politicians in Santa Fe.

Though nobody was convicted for the homicide, a state corporation commissioner was tried on morals charges for serving Coogler liquor when she was a minor and having her “in his possession for evil purposes.”

Commissioner Dan Sedillo was acquitted of those charges after the three major prosecution witnesses invoked the Fifth Amendment.

Sedillo was in the Las Cruces area the night Coogler was last seen alive. He had flown to El Paso with then Lt. Gov. Joe Montoya — later a U.S. senator. The book cites testimony from a witness who saw Montoya, Sedillo and Coogler in the same motel room hours before the killing. (Montoya, a Democrat, never was charged with any crime.)

Another Coogler-related case that went to trial was a federal civil-rights case. Sheriff Apodaca, state Police Chief Hubert Beasley and Deputy Roy Sandman were accused of torturing a black man in an attempt to get a murder confession. The three were convicted and served a year in prison.

Author Sandman has a personal ax to grind here. Roy Sandman was his father.

Pete Sandman said in a telephone interview this week that he believes his father was framed and that accounts by the torture victim, Wesley Byrd, were full of discrepancies.

The author said his father didn’t believe Byrd was guilty. Roy Sandman, who left the Sheriff’s Department to work for the district attorney shortly after Coogler’s murder, was instrumental in revealing many of the illegal-gambling connections with the case, his son said.

In 1953, when Pete Sandman was 4 years old, Roy Sandman died of a gunshot wound to his head. While law-enforcement officials called the death a suicide, a coroner’s jury only would classify his death as “gunshot wounds, causes unknown.” Pete Sandman believes his father was murdered as payback for his investigative work.

Sandman quotes a former state representative, Sixto Leyva of Santo Domingo, who in a speech on the House floor in 1951 over a bill to fund a full investigation of the Coogler case said:

“Any time any members of one party become so powerful they can dictate to the judiciary to cover up a crime, as they did in (Doña Ana) County, it is up to us as elected representatives of the people to solve that crime. ... Somebody from high up was covering up the murder of this girl. Some high official is involved in this case.”

What happened to that bill? According to Sandman’s book, it passed the House. But “it was sent to the Senate where it disappeared.”

(Murder Near the Crosses is published by Barbed Wire Publishing. A page for this book should be up soon, Sandman said.)

Blog Bonus: An Aug. 15, 1949 article about the Cricket Coogler murder can be found HERE

A little excerpt:

At 18, pretty, ignorant little Ovida ("Cricket") Coogler was a
product of New Mexico's political corruption. ... Under Happy (Apodaca) and his political friends nobody cared if a girl like Cricket ran wild. Occasionally, as a matter of fact, flashy politicos from the state capital itself came to Las Cruces and obligingly helped her get drunk.

Back to the present: A group that was indicted in 2004 on a charge of making an illegal $100,000 campaign contribution to former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay’s political action committee is running television ads in New Mexico supporting U.S. Rep. Heather Wilson, R-N.M.

The Alliance for Quality Nursing Home Care is an umbrella group for 15 for-profit members of the American Health Care Association.

The ad never suggests voting for Wilson. It just thanks her for “Fighting for New Mexico seniors. Voting to protect Medicare funding for quality nursing home care (and) standing up for New Mexico seniors.”

“Heather Wilson likes to talk about her integrity,” said Heather Brewer, a spokeswoman for Wilson’s Democratic opponent, Attorney General Patricia Madrid. “She needs to stop talking and take action by standing up to this scandalous organization and demanding they stop spending their tainted money on ads supporting her campaign.”

Wilson spokesman Enrique Carlos Knell said Wilson has no control over third-party ads “any more than we do over the thousands of dollars spent to bash Heather Wilson in support of Patsy Madrid.”

PANEL DISCUSSION WITH ALGERIAN OFFICIALS

On Tuesday I was part of a panel -- along with state Sen. Dede Feldman and Bob Johnson, director of New Mexico Foundation for Open Government -- that met with a visiting delegation of Algerians, three women and two men that included a couple of judges, a lawyer, a diplomat and the director of an organization that aids women who are victims of violence.

The visitors wanted to learn about how New Mexico is dealing with corruption and ethics reform. But in our discussions, through French interpreters, I believe I learned more from them than they did from me.

Lawyer Khaled Bourayou -- whose clients include Algerian newspapers -- gave us a brief history of his country. Algeria won independence from France in 1962 and was a one-party socialist state until 1989 when the country adopted a new constitution. Bourayou said the official policy of Algeria now favors human rights, equality for women, free elections, freedom of press and private property rights. But the government's main problem remains its struggle with Islamic fundamentalists who want to estalish an Islamic Republic.

Although press freedom is the offical policy, Borayou said his government had to crack down on a radical Isamic paper that was calling for the overthrow of the government.

I told him here that in the U.S. many of us feel that the free expression of extremist views is considered a safety valve and that most people reject the truly crazy ideas. He argued that Algeria is such a religious society the Islamic extremists are able to manipulate the people and that the paper had to be shut down because it was a threat to freedom. He reminded me of this country's McCarthy era. I agreed that there are always those who would take our freedoms away and that you always have to be vigilant.

(Here is a recent article (from a South African site) about the Islmamic milita in Algeria linked to al Qaeda, which says the movement is in decline. Violence between the fundamentalists and the government has cost an estimated 200,000 lives since 1992.)

Mohamed Amara, a Supreme Court magistrate, asked why corruption was a problem in a country so affluent where civil servants are well paid. I answered with a line from an Elvis Presley song: "A poor man wants to be a rich man, a rich man wants to be king."

By the way, I was surprised that at least some of the Algerians were already familiar with our state treasurer scandal. New Mexico's corruption is known worldwide!

MYSTIC JUDICIAL DWARVES

My brother alerted me to this critical news story.

Filipino 'dwarf' judge loses case

A Philippines judge who said he consulted imaginary mystic dwarves has failed to convince the Supreme Court to allow him to keep his job.

Florentino Floro was appealing against a three-year inquiry which led to his removal due to incompetence and bias.

He told investigators three mystic dwarves - Armand, Luis and Angel - had helped him to carry out healing sessions during breaks in his chambers.

But, you know, it probably wouldn't hurt if Armand, Luis and Angel would advise some New Mexico judges ...

UPDATE: This morning I found an extremely lengthy (like 17 times larger than the original post) comment from someone claiming to be Judge Floro. I reluctantly deleted it just due to space. (For some reason the comments here appear on my blog itself, not in a separate pop-up. Blogger hasn't been able to help me. I've got to do something about that.)

Most of the comment was repetitive recapping of the news story from various sources and comments of support from others. Here is a link to Judge Floro's blog, where some of those comments seem to come from. Again, I can't vouch for the authenticity, but it's pretty interesting. I'll save the original comment so if anyone wants to see the whole thing, e-mail me.

FROGFEST DAY 2

All my Frogfest Photos are HERE.

Right as I was about to leave the second day of Frogfest Sunday night, John Treadwell (Dear Leader and president-for-life of Frogville Records ) came up and said to me, "Well, are you going to tell Santa Fe what a great show they missed?"

I guess I'm doing that now.

Frogfest was loads of fun for those of us who went. To those who didn't: You shoulda been there ... No way around it, the turnout was disappointing. Probably the weather scared off many. Then, it was Indian Market, which traditionally is a weekend when many locals leave town. (And Saturday night there was the Native Roots & Rhythms concert at Paolo Soelri, which I heard also suffered from the rain).

Sometimes it seemed that the camera crews nearly outnumbered the audience. Not only was the L.A. Filmmakers Cooperative there (they'd been camped out at Treadwell's place for a few days), but local filmmaker Lexie Shabel had a crew there. A couple of years ago Lexie did a short documentary called VFWya, which was about the scene that spawned Frogville. I did an on-camera convesation with her about the meaning of it all.

Anywho, I've said it for years: Santa Fe has a lot more good musicians than it deserves. We're lucky to have a Frogville and Frogfest. Consider this a wag of the finger, you sunshine music scenesters!

I have to confess, I was pretty much towed away myself after Saturday's Frogfest spectacular. I didn't drag my fat ass to the Santa Fe Brewing Company until just before 2 p.m. Upon arrival my friend Bruce chided me about missing the first act. "You missed Toast!" I felt like saying "I AM toast."

For the most part I planted myself in the KSFR booth for the first part of the day, wandering up to the stage every now and then to catch Nathan Moore's set and the Texas Saphires (who do a great honky tonk version of X's "The New World.")

I didn't really come to life until about the time Goshen came on stage. Grant Hyunga, backed by The Brothers Palmer did his hopped-up Hounddog-Taylor-on-Angel-Dust tribal stomp, grating and hypnotic at the same time. It was wonderfully invigorating.

After this, two of Frogville's finest -- Nathan Moore and Joe West -- did a battle of the singer-songwriters, passing a single guitar back and forth.

James McMurty was the headliner. He was the only national name on the bill. Unfortunately I had to leave to do my radio show before he finished, but at least I got to snap a couple of pictures and hear him do "60 Acres," "Can't Make It Here" and my favorite, "Choctaw Bingo" before I had to leave.

Even though the turnout was disappointing, some of the Frogville folks already are talking about next year. Sure hope they follow through.

Now only two weeks til Thirsty Ear!

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, August 20, 2006
KSFR, Santa Fe, N.M.
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell

OPENING THEME: Let it Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres
Teenage Prostitute by Frank Zappa
Undercover of the Night by The Rolling Stones
Little Tease by Goshen
Contort Yourself by James Chance
The League of Bald-Headed Men by The Fall
Sheela na Gig by P.J. Harvey
Ten Commandments by Hellwood

I Love You Still by Hundred Year Flood
Cartwheels by Patti Smith
In Total Focus by Drywall
Blue Skies by Terry Adams and Marshall Allen
Things We Like To Do by NRBQ
Man About Town by Tony Gilkyson
Just a Gigolo by Bing Crosby

Milkcow Blues by Dead Moon
Sister Midnight by Iggy Pop
Snake in the Radio by Mark Pickerel
Skip to the End by The Futureheads
The Modern Dance by Pere Ubu
Wildcat by Pretty Girls Make Graves
Hands by The Racontuers
KKK by The BusBoys

Thing of Beauty by Hothouse Flowers
Hibernation Statement by Redneck Manifesto
Summer Jazz by The Electric Ghosts
Eve of Destruction by P.F. Sloan with Frank Black and Buddy Miller
Inside Job by Pearl Jam
CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis

FROGFEST DAY 1

I'm too exhausted to to into much detail about the first day of Frogfest. (And Day 2 is still before me) I think I'll let my photos do most of the talking.

But it indeed was a blast and a half. I was manning the KSFR booth for most of the day, but it wasn't hard to catch the music. (After the rain moved the festival inside the Santa Fe Brewing Company for a couple of hours Saturday evening, we gave up on the booth for the day.)

Hundred Year Flood did a surprisingly strong set especially considering the steady drizzle at the beginning of their performance. It climaxed with the appearance of a trio of fire dancers who provided a hell of a ligth show.

Joe West got back from England Saturday night, but jet lag didn't hinder his set with The Santa Fe All Stars (Sharon Gilchrist, Ben Wright and Susan Hyde Holmes).

I'd never seen Boris McCutcheon live before, but it was worth the wait to see Boris & The Saltlicks. ("Caves of Burgundy" was the highlight.)

And though I'd never actually seen Percy Boyd, I'd seen all the musicians before (Nathan Moore of ThaMuseMeant, most of Hundred Year Flood and steel guitarist Augie Hayes.)

There were old favorites like Bill Hearne and Jono Manson, and some bitchen neo-honky-tonk from Dave Insley & The careless Smokers.

One of my favorite moments was a relatively quiet one. Blind James, a singer who reminds me a little bit of Michael Hurley, was doing his set inside the Brewing Company singing his song "On the Banks of The Rio Grande." When he got to the chorus, from behind me came a heavenly chorus -- surround sound! It was members of Hundred Year Flood singing harmony parts. Lord it was fine.

Check ot my Frogfest photos.




Speaking of Hundred Year Flood, check out this You Tube video.