Pictured is Chief Medina’s unmarked City Issue Police Truck. The truck is equipped with lights, siren, and a police radio for communications
Albuquerque – Earlier today, we were on the way to a scheduled press conference at the Adams Market on Central and Pennsylvania NE. The press conference was to be hosted by Mayor Keller and Chief Medina. While on the way to the event, we got an email that said: “This press conference has been CANCELED for today and will be rescheduled for a later time”. We immediately learned that the reason the event was canceled was because Chief Medina and his wife had gotten into a crash while patrolling the SE area command in his city-issued unmarked police truck.
During an impromptu press conference at Central and Alvarado, civilian PIO Gilbert Gallegos, APD Commander Luke Languit, and Mayor Keller addressed the circumstances of the crash. Apparently, Chief Medina and his wife were driving on Central near Alvarado when he noticed a homeless encampment that was spilling into the roadway of Alvarado NE, just north of Central.
WATCH THE PRESS CONFERENCE HERE:
Chief Medina apparently turned around to investigate this and was in the process of calling the area command boss for assistance when he noticed two campers fighting each other. At one point, one of the campers pulled out a gun and fired in the direction of the Chief and possibly the other camper.
Chief Medina sped southbound across the westbound lanes of Central, but when he reached the eastbound lanes, he slammed into a classic ’66 gold Ford Mustang, which was occupied by only one person. The impact disabled both the Chief’s truck and the valuable classic Mustang in the intersection. The driver of the Mustang was transported to UNMH, and we heard they were undergoing surgery for unknown injuries.
The two people who were involved in the alleged shootout escaped the area and were never seen again. Officers could be heard asking if the cameras in the area were on and an RTCC (Real time crime center) person said they had just gone “offline.”
Albuquerque Mayor Tim Keller sent out a tweet applauding the Chief’s response:
We asked PIO Gilbert if Chief Harold Medina was out of policy for having his wife in the vehicle when the crash occurred. Civilian PIO Gallegos sternly said, “no”.
All of this makes us question the policies and procedures of APD officers driving a police car with lights, siren, and a radio, while also having their spouse in the vehicle during a critical incident unfolding. APD’s SOP is pretty clear about what should be done when operating a police car. It is unclear if these rules actually apply to a Chief of Police or if its just the hard working patrol officers on duty that it is applied to. We found the APD SOP section that talks about department vehicle use and it is attached:
It is also unclear if per department policy Chief Medina was taken for a post crash drug test. Also unknown is if Chief Medina activated his body worn camera during the incident. ABQ RAW will be requesting all records pertaining to this incident.
