Hearing will clear up judge’s ruling

The case involving Socorro Electric Cooperative’s lawsuit against its member-owners is moving ahead to the cross-claim phase, but not before a few matters have been cleared up first.

District Court Judge Albert J. Mitchell Jr. ruled against the co-op last month, saying that bylaws passed by members at the 2010 annual meeting were properly adopted and are valid, and that the co-op should have been following them since then.
The bylaws require the co-op to follow the New Mexico Open Meetings Act and Inspection of Public Records Act.
At last month’s hearing, Mitchell directed the Deschamps and Kortemeier law firm of Socorro, representing the defendants in the original case and the cross-claim plaintiffs in the countersuit, to draft an order spelling out the judge’s ruling.
While a proposed order has been submitted, attorneys for the Kennedy and Han law firm of Albuquerque, representing the co-op, objected to some of the language in the draft order, and that will be the first item addressed during a status hearing scheduled for Thursday, June 16, at 1:30 p.m. The hearing will be held telephonically.
“Typically when there’s a significant case and the court rules from the bench, as I did, there’s an honest disagreement about what I said,” Mitchell said in a phone interview on Monday. “So the purpose of this hearing will be to clarify that and keep everybody paying attention so the case keeps moving forward.”
Mitchell, who typically holds court in the 10th Judicial District Court in Quay County, said the primary purpose of the hearing is to get the order into its final form.
“Until that’s finalized, everybody is in a holding pattern,” he said.
Once that’s cleared up, the judge said he’ll address the scheduling of hearings for the cross claim.
“Due to the large number of parties, I’m scheduling time into the future — even before I have motions,” he said. “That way, we’re sure everyone has it on their calendar and we’ll move forward.”
Mitchell said he was satisfied with the pace of the case so far.
“It’s nice to do cases with good attorneys on both sides. Everybody’s doing a good job,” he said.
While the lawsuit was originally filed almost a year ago, the case was delayed for several months while parties either excused judges that were assigned to the case or the judges recused themselves. Mitchell was ultimately appointed to the case by the New Mexico Supreme Court Justice after all seven judges in the 13th Judicial District had been disqualified.
The first hearing in the case was held last December in Los Lunas, where the lawsuit was originally filed. Since then, there was a status hearing in Los Lunas last February and most recently a merits hearing in Socorro on May 18 when the judge made the ruling against the co-op.
The co-op originally filed the lawsuit against all of its approximately 10,000 members in Valencia County where a small percentage of its members reside. Last month’s hearing was set in Socorro as a matter of convenience and drew approximately 100 spectators.
The judge previously told attorneys that one of the first things he wants to address with the cross claim are damages that are being requested. The cross claim asks for members of the co-op’s board of trustees to be removed and any compensation found to have been improperly received be paid back out of their own pocket, so as not to do harm to the co-op.
Socorro Electric’s attorneys have claimed that the co-op’s agreement with its insurance carrier will not cover defending the case because it’s a dispute between trustees.
District 5 trustee Charlie Wagner of Magdalena, a leader in the movement to reform the co-op, is named as representative of the class of member-owners in the countersuit, which requests class action certification.
Defendants in the cross claim are the nine other trustees, four former trustees and the co-op’s former general manager. The countersuit alleges the cross claim defendants committed fraud, negligence and breach of fiduciary duty,