Long hard hours for Sheriff's Investigators

This is not the place to talk about Sheriff's Office cases but I do want to talk a little about dedication. As you all may know we have just had our second homicide in 3 days. Very unusual for Santa Fe County. As an example we had two homicides in all of 2005. Both homicides happened in the early evening between 7 and 8 pm. When you get something like this the detectives have been up all day then are called out to work on the homicide. Processing the crime scene, interviewing witnesses, locating possible suspects, and many other tasks must be completed immediately. In the case of the first homicide, the murder of Jean Sandoval, investigators worked up to 36 hours straight with no sleep. Investigators may surpass that time today with the Eric Baca murder.

These are long hard hours. On shows like C.S.I. evidence is collected in minutes and a suspect is found all within the hour. In real life it can take 12 -14 hours or longer to process a crime scene. In both these cases New Mexico State Police Crime Scene Investigators came out and assisted with the collection of evidence and put in the long hours right along side our deputies. All this evidence can take months to process. In the mean time detectives are solving crimes with their wits and good old fashioned investigative technique. Patrol deputies spend hours just standing at road blocks or around the perimeter of the crime scene making sure it is secure and nothing leaves or enters the scene that we don't know about. So I dedicate this post to the great deputies and investigators of the Santa Fe County Sheriff's Office, The New Mexico State Police, and the thousands of Law Enforcement Officers just like them across the country who are putting in the extra long hours to make sure justice is done.

As a closing note a prayer for the families and loved ones of Jean Sandoval and Eric Baca. I want you to know that we are working hard to solve these cases and wont stop until we do.