{"id":25161,"date":"2024-10-25T19:15:42","date_gmt":"2024-10-26T01:15:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/case-against-montezuma-da-stalls-new-investigation-begins\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T23:11:02","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T05:11:02","slug":"case-against-montezuma-da-stalls-new-investigation-begins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/case-against-montezuma-da-stalls-new-investigation-begins\/","title":{"rendered":"Case against Montezuma DA stalls; new investigation begins"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Christian
Christian Hatfield<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Possible drunken driving charges against Montezuma County District Attorney Christian Hatfield have stalled while the San Juan County Sheriff\u2019s Office awaits the results of a blood sample secured the night of his Aug. 30 crash outside Farmington on U.S. Highway 64.<\/p>\n

And in Montezuma County, Sheriff Steven Nowlin said a new investigation began last week after Hatfield took part in a thread of texts that contained insulting, inaccurate and sexist comments against a reporter for The Journal.<\/em><\/p>\n

In Farmington, the delays in the case were attributed in part to a staff shortage.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Sheriff\u2019s Office is still awaiting blood results from the state lab for possible criminal charging,\u201d Sheriff Shane Ferrari told the Tri-City Record<\/em> in an email Wednesday. \u201cI do not have a timeline when we will be receiving those back.\u201d<\/p>\n

An Inspection of Public Records request by the Tri-City Record<\/em> on Oct. 13 asked for correspondence including emails, text messages and letters between the Sheriff\u2019s Office and the San Juan County District Attorney\u2019s Office that concerned Hatfield and the crash.<\/p>\n

According to emails obtained by the Tri-City Record,<\/em> officials discovered that the blood sample had been \u201csitting in the fridge\u201d since Aug. 30 because the request to process it did not make it through the Law Enforcement Records Management System.<\/p>\n

The blood work was \u201cchecked in and ready to be mailed,\u201d as of 8:39 a.m. Oct. 4, according to an email sent by Sheriff\u2019s Office evidence custodian Elijah Montoya.<\/p>\n

The Journal<\/em> and Tri-City Record<\/em> also requested on Sept. 3 and again on Oct. 13 copies of dash camera and lapel camera videos from the crash. The requests have not yet been fulfilled.<\/p>\n

Ferrari attributed the delay to staffing shortages in his office, which has just one full-time employee who works to fulfill records requests.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are normally staffed with four full-time and have now increased to five to keep up with demand,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cLike other law enforcement agencies, this comes at a difficult time as we have seen a continued increase in records requests, specifically with video, which is labor intensive,\u201d Ferrari said. \u201cOur staffing situation is improving.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Oct. 23, The Journal<\/em> newspaper in Cortez and the Tri-City Record<\/em> in Farmington also requested copies of the blood warrant, search warrant and arrest warrant for Hatfield.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter reviewing your request, it has been determined that those documents are currently pending. I will continue to research and provide the response as soon as they are available,\u201d said Jennifer Coponiti, records clerk at the Sheriff\u2019s Office.<\/p>\n

This week, amid the uncertainty of the delayed documents, Hatfield launched an attack surrounding the news coverage.<\/p>\n

After a freelance reporter at The Journal<\/em> texted Hatfield for comment about the status of this case, he stated in a text message on Oct. 17 that he would not answer the reporter directly.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe last article about me was so poorly written and inaccurate that we should stick to press releases,\u201d Hatfield said in a text to the reporter.<\/p>\n

On Oct. 22, texts from Hatfield became more aggressive, and a third party, identified only by a phone number, joined in. The 2024 voters registration list connected that number, along with an address, to retired Durango defense lawyer Thomas Williamson, and in an emailed response to the Tri-City Record, he identified himself as the third party.<\/em><\/p>\n

The reporter from The Journal<\/em> was included in Hatfield\u2019s text thread.<\/p>\n

Hatfield began by attacking the reporter\u2019s values.<\/p>\n

\u201cI did not know until I asked around that you were an ultra-right-wing christian nationalist \u2026 who had gone to Jerry Falwell \u2018college.\u2019 I should have been less naive in assuming journalistic integrity. I have since read your badly written, intellectually muddled Federalist op-ed opinions. Ballantine (Ballantine Communications Inc.) used to have standards. My parents wrote for the Boston Globe.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019d she gets (sic) wrong?\u201d the Williamson asked. \u201cDidn\u2019t she just read cop report?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cShe said there were drugs and alcohol in my car,\u201d Hatfield wrote to the third party. \u201cThe report said no alcohol, no drugs, aside from a full bottle of Ambien I filled the day before.\u201d<\/p>\n

Williamson then added a sexual slur in his response:<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s just being creative. You\u2019re obviously not Godly and that might explain it \u2026 Demand (c**t) retract.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hatfield ended the thread by stating, \u201cI personally pulled every item from my car at the salvage yard.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to the San Juan County Sheriff\u2019s Office, a search warrant was still pending, but Ferrari confirmed that Hatfield could have removed items from his vehicle because the Sheriff\u2019s Office did not seize the car for \u201cevidence.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo it is quite possible he went there, pulled out all of his belongings,\u201d Ferrari said.<\/p>\n

And New Mexico State Police Officer Joseph Cloyd\u2019s report stated that evidence of alcohol and a prescribed sedative were found at the crash scene.<\/p>\n

\u201cI observed an open container of an alcoholic beverage located on the front passenger floorboard labeled Mexican Lager. The container was crushed from the sides but still had residual liquid,\u201d he wrote in the police report.<\/p>\n

Cloyd also stated there was a \u201ca pill bottle with several pills inside next to this open container labeled Ambien,\u201d which had Hatfield\u2019s name on it.<\/p>\n

Cloyd stated in the report that \u201cevidence of intoxication of alcohol and or drugs was present on Driver 1 (Hatfield), and in the vehicle Driver 1 failed to maintain the traffic lanes resulting in a crash.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Tri-City Record<\/em> called and left phone messages for Hatfield and Williamson on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Williamson responded by email on Friday after this article was published online, saying he was unaware Hatfield had included the reporter in the thread.<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought I was just talking to Mr. Hatfield and the minute I was notified that the reporter he was complaining about was actually on the thread, I apologized for my comments and explained I thought I was only talking to Mr. Hatfield,\u201d Williamson wrote.<\/p>\n

That text read, \u201cI aplkigize (sic) for my language. I thought I was just talking to Hatfield.\u201d<\/p>\n

Williams characterized his use of the sexist slur as just talk between friends and not directed at the reporter.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile I regret my language, it\u2019s a big difference to use such language in conversation with a friend as opposed to using a slur, which incidentally I also do concerning men, to the person being discussed,\u201d he wrote in his email.<\/p>\n

Williamson stated that leaving out the information about his lack of knowledge of the reporter\u2019s presence, \u201cit looks like possible criminal conduct by me.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI apologized for my comments and explained I thought I was only talking to Mr. Hatfield,\u201d Williamson wrote. \u201cIt can be criminal conduct if it were some intentional harassment not a mistake but your article does not explain that I was unaware that she was actually on a text message to me from Mr. Hatfield. Why he texted her and why he did not tell me he was doing this when he texted me, I do not know.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hatfield, a former defense attorney who has worked in Farmington and Durango, was appointed district attorney by Gov. Jared Polis in 2023. Running as a Democrat, he now faces a challenge by Republican Jeremy Reed, a former deputy district attorney under Hatfield in the Nov. 5 election.<\/p>\n

This article was updated Oct. 25 to report that Thomas Williamson is a retired lawyer and to include a text in the thread in which he apologized for his language.<\/em><\/p>\n

This article was updated Oct. 26 to include statements from a email sent to the Tri-City Record by Thomas Williamson.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

results and charges pending in crash case; new investigation started after texts to reporter<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16494,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-25161","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25161","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25161"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25161\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":78822,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25161\/revisions\/78822"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16494"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25161"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25161"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25161"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=25161"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}