Copyright 2022 Albuquerque Journal
An Albuquerque Police Department detective alleges in a whistleblower lawsuit that investigators violated the constitutional rights of a man charged in the 2019 shooting death of Jacqueline Vigil.
The lawsuit alleges APD investigators who questioned Luis Talamantes-Romero in San Antonio, Texas, ignored his repeated requests for an attorney and failed to inform him of his constitutional rights.
APD detective Jessie Carter alleges in the lawsuit that APD retaliated against him after he reported the alleged violations to the District Attorney’s Office and an APD supervisor.
Carter was suspended for four days in 2021 after an internal affairs investigation into a botched identification that resulted in an innocent 17-year-old girl being charged with murder and jailed for six days in 2019.
Talamantes-Romero, 34, was arrested in August 2020 by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and later charged in Albuquerque with first-degree murder in Vigil’s killing. A trial has not been scheduled in the case.
Vigil, the 55-year-old mother of two New Mexico State Police officers, was shot to death Nov. 19, 2019, in the front seat of her car in the driveway of her West Side home. Vigil was on her way to the gym when she was fatally shot.
Three APD investigators traveled to San Antonio to interview Talamantes-Romero in August 2020, shortly after his arrest, according to the suit.
Carter alleges he listened to an audio recording of that interview...
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