A. There is created the "New Mexico sentencing commission".

B. The New Mexico sentencing commission shall be composed of twenty-seven members. Appointed members shall serve at the pleasure of the appointing authority. The commission shall reflect reasonable geographical and urban-rural balances and regard for the incidence of crime and the distribution and concentration of law enforcement services in the state. The commission shall consist of the following individuals or their designees:

(1) the attorney general;

(2) a district attorney appointed by the New Mexico district attorney's association or its successor agency;

(3) the chief public defender;

(4) two district court judges, one of whom shall be a children's court judge, appointed by the district and metropolitan judges association or its successor agency;

(5) a magistrate judge appointed by the chief justice of the supreme court;

(6) the dean of the university of New Mexico school of law;

(7) the secretary of corrections;

(8) the secretary of public safety;

(9) the secretary of children, youth and families;

(10) the secretary of public education;

(11) a representative from the behavioral health services division of the human services department;

(12) a county sheriff appointed by the executive director of New Mexico counties;

(13) two public members appointed by the governor, one of whom shall be designated as chair of the New Mexico sentencing commission by the governor;

(14) three public members appointed by the president pro tempore of the senate;

(15) one public member appointed by the minority floor leader of the senate;

(16) three public members appointed by the speaker of the house of representatives;

(17) one public member appointed by the minority floor leader of the house of representatives;

(18) two public members appointed by the chief justice of the supreme court;

(19) one public member who is Native American and a practicing attorney, appointed by the president of the state bar association; and

(20) one public member appointed by the governor who is a representative of a New Mexico victims' organization.

C. A majority of the members of the New Mexico sentencing commission constitutes a quorum for the transaction of commission business.

D. The New Mexico sentencing commission shall:

(1) hold meetings at times and for periods as the commission deems necessary;

(2) hire staff as needed to assist the commission in the performance of its duties;

(3) prepare an annual budget;

(4) establish policies for the operation of the commission and supervision of the activities of commission staff;

(5) advise the executive, judicial and legislative branches of government on policy matters relating to criminal and juvenile justice;

(6) make recommendations to the legislature concerning proposed changes to laws relating to the criminal and juvenile justice systems that the commission determines would improve those systems;

(7) annually assess, monitor and report to the legislature on the impact of any enacted sentencing standards and guidelines on state and local correctional resources and programs and the need for further sentencing reform;

(8) when developing proposed sentencing reform:

(a) study sentencing models in other jurisdictions;

(b) study the Criminal Sentencing Act [Chapter 31, Article 18 NMSA 1978], the Criminal Code [30-1-1 NMSA 1978] and all other New Mexico statutes relating to criminal law, criminal sentencing, criminal procedure and probation and parole;

(c) review past studies or reports regarding proposed changes to the Children's Code [Chapter 32A NMSA 1978], the Criminal Code, the Criminal Sentencing Act or other New Mexico statutes relating to criminal law, criminal sentencing, criminal procedure or probation and parole;

(d) study past and current criminal sentencing and release practices and create a statistical database for simulating the impact of various sentencing policies;

(e) study the full range of prison, nonprison and intermediate sanctions;

(f) determine the principal purpose for criminal sanctions;

(g) rank criminal offenses by degree of seriousness;

(h) determine the role of criminal history in making criminal sentencing decisions;

(i) define dispositional policy that determines when adult felony offenders are confined in state prisons and county jails or sentenced to nonprison and intermediate sanctions;

(j) establish the length of criminal sentences;

(k) establish the appropriate use of community service and fines;

(l) structure proposed sentencing guidelines to ensure consistency in all aspects of criminal sentencing policy;

(m) assess the impact of commission recommendations to modify criminal sentencing policy on the availability of and need for correctional resources and programs;

(n) use the expertise of a national or state organization with experience in sentencing reform; and

(o) present proposed legislation or recommendations regarding sentencing reform to the appropriate legislative interim committee;

(9) monitor any enacted sentencing guidelines with respect to uniformity and proportionality;

(10) conduct research relating to the use and effectiveness of any enacted guidelines, prosecution standards, offense charging, plea bargaining, sentencing practices, probation and parole practices and any other matters relating to the criminal justice system;

(11) serve as a clearinghouse for the systematic collection, analysis and dissemination of information relating to felony offense charges, plea agreements, convictions, sentences imposed, incarceration time actually served and actual and projected inmate population in the state correctional system;

(12) review all proposed legislation that creates a new criminal offense, changes the classification of an offense or changes the range of punishments for an offense and make recommendations to the legislature as to whether proposed changes would improve the criminal and juvenile justice system;

(13) contingent upon the availability of funding, provide impact estimates, incorporating prison population projections, on all proposed legislation that has the potential to affect correctional resources;

(14) create and maintain a data-sharing network to receive, store, analyze and disseminate criminal justice data for and between participating criminal justice and behavioral health agencies for the purpose of evaluating local and statewide criminal justice systems and programs and supporting, encouraging and accomplishing information sharing among criminal justice agencies and criminal justice coordinating councils;

(15) provide data analysis as requested by criminal justice agencies and criminal justice coordinating councils; and

(16) promulgate rules governing the data- sharing network and data analysis pursuant to Paragraphs (14) and (15) of this subsection. The rules shall include procedures to:

(a) fulfill any requirements related to data privacy, security and protection so that information access and sharing is permitted for authorized purposes, as defined by law, court order or for business practices that are a necessary component of the requesting agency's duties and functions and is compatible with the purpose and expectations of use under which the information was collected;

(b) guide participating agencies to ensure accuracy, completeness, currency and reliability of information reported to the data-sharing network;

(c) allow data querying and reporting tools for those authorized users who want to perform statistical analysis of some of the data collected and retained;

(d) provide safeguards to actively monitor and record: 1) access and use of the network's services and systems; and 2) the nature of information exchanges using the network; and

(e) identify and recognize authorized users who access the network.

E. The members of the New Mexico sentencing commission shall be paid pursuant to the Per Diem and Mileage Act [10-8-1 to 10-8-8 NMSA 1978] and shall receive no other perquisite, compensation or allowance.

F. The New Mexico sentencing commission is administratively attached to the office of the governor.

History: 1978 Comp., § 9-3-10, enacted by Laws 1977, ch. 257, § 11; 1979, ch. 202, § 5; 1980, ch. 150, § 7; 1981, ch. 73, § 7; 1994, ch. 19, § 1; 2003, ch. 75, § 1; 2007, ch. 9, § 2; 2019, ch. 192, § 1.

The 2019 amendment, effective July 1, 2019, added three members to the New Mexico sentencing commission, and required the New Mexico sentencing commission to create a data-sharing network for criminal justice data; in Subsection B, after "composed of", changed "twenty-four" to "twenty-seven", in Paragraph B(4), after "appointed by the district", changed "court judge's" to "metropolitan judges", in Paragraph B(5), after "a", added "magistrate", after the next occurrence of "judge", deleted "from the court of appeals", and after "chief", deleted "judge of the court of appeals" and added "justice of the supreme court", added a new Paragraph B(11) and redesignated former Paragraphs B(11) through B(13) as Paragraphs B(12) through B(14), respectively, added a new Paragraph B(15) and redesignated former Paragraph B(14) as Paragraph B(16), added a new Paragraph B(17) and redesignated former Paragraphs B(15) through B(17) as Paragraphs B(18) through B(20), respectively; and in Subsection D, added Paragraphs D(14) through D(16).

The 2007 amendment, effective July 1, 2007, changed the number of members from twenty-three to twenty-four in Subsection B and added the secretary of public education as a member in Subsection B(10).

The 2003 amendment, effective July 1, 2003, substituted "New Mexico sentencing commission" for "criminal and juvenile justice coordinating council" in the section heading; substituted "New Mexico sentencing commission" for "criminal and juvenile justice coordinating council" throughout the section; substituted "twenty-three" for "fifteen" preceding "members" near the end of the first sentence of Subsection B; substituted "commission" for "council" throughout the section; substituted "school" for "college" following "New Mexico" near the end of Subsection B(6); in Subsection B(16) substituted "appointed by the governor who is a representative of a" for "who is the president of the" following "one public member" near the beginning and deleted "assistance" following "victim" near the end; inserted "justice" following "juvenile" near the middle of Subsection D(6); substituted present Subsection D(7) for former Subsection D(7); and inserted a Subsection D(8) designation and rewrote the rest of Subsection D.

The 1994 amendment, effective July 1, 1994, inserted "and juvenile" in the section heading and in Subsection A; in Subsection B, substituted Paragraphs (1) to (15) for former Paragraphs (1) to (4), relating to the same subject matter and, in the introductory paragraph, inserted "and juvenile" and substituted "nineteen" for "not less than fifteen nor more than twenty" in the first sentence, substituted the present second sentence for the former second sentence, which read: "All members except the automatic members shall be appointed by the governor", and rewrote the last sentence, which read: "Until mandated otherwise by federal law or regulation as a condition to receiving federal funds, the council shall consist of"; substituted present Subsections C and D for former Subsection C, relating to the duties of the criminal justice coordinating council; redesignated former Subsection D as present Subsection E and, in that subsection, inserted "and juvenile" and deleted "who are not representing governmental entities" following "council"; and added Subsection F.