By Rick Wright
David Vega sat out an entire
football season while under suspension because of an arrest stemming from an
Albuquerque Police Department search, later declared illegal, of his home.
Vega will never get that season
back — though he did wind up saving a year’s eligibility the hard way.
Neither, however, will the city
of Albuquerque get back the $45,000 it has paid to settle a lawsuit filed
against APD by the UNM quarterback.
“It’s a fair result for David,”
Colin Hunter, one of Vega’s attorneys, said of the settlement. “He’s pleased
with it, and we’re happy it worked out.”
Deputy City Attorney Kathryn
Levy said the decision to settle was based on financial concerns.
“It was determined,” Levy wrote
in an email to the Journal, “it was in the City’s best economic interest to
resolve the case early as the value of the case would be driven largely by
attorney’s fees incurred by plaintiff’s counsel.”
Efforts by the Journal to reach
Vega for comment were unsuccessful.
Vega sued APD, alleging false
arrest and false imprisonment. He was arrested Aug. 26, 2012, after APD
Officers Yoki Maurx and Michael Harrison, responding to a complaint about
stolen property, entered a house Vega shared with three roommates without
permission.
According to Vega’s lawsuit,
filed April 9, 2013, in U.S. District Court, Maurx coerced Vega’s three
roommates into signing consent forms for a search of the premises after the
fact. When Vega refused to do so, he was arrested on charges of possession of
alcohol by a minor (now 22, he was 20 at the time) and attempting to conceal
his identity.
The stolen property that
brought Maurx and Harrison to Vega’s neighborhood was not found and was not a
factor in the arrest.
According to the lawsuit, Maurx
either turned off his lapel video camera while making the arrest or destroyed
that part of the video.
Lobos football coach Bob Davie
suspended Vega two days later, in large part because the former Roswell Goddard
and New Mexico Military Institute star had not told him of the arrest.
Also, Vega had been suspended
briefly for undisclosed reasons during the team’s training camp in Ruidoso
earlier in August.
At the time, after talking with
Vega about the circumstances of his arrest, Davie said he might not have
suspended the player the second time if not for those two factors.
Davie said he would allow Vega
a chance to prove his innocence, “but he won’t be on this football team until
he does.”
Vega missed the entire 2012
season, which effectively became a redshirt season, while under suspension.
Last February, charges against
Vega were dropped because the APD search had been deemed illegal by the
District Attorney’s Office. According to the lawsuit, Maurx used the discovery
of vomit outside the house — citing the possibility of alcohol poisoning — as a
pretext to enter.
In the lawsuit, it was noted
that Maurx had pleaded guilty in 2011 to knowingly having provided false
testimony in a 2009 DWI case. Levy said Maurx has since been fired, though not
as a result of the Vega arrest and lawsuit.
Shortly after the charges were
dropped, Vega was reinstated by Davie. Last season, playing behind quarterbacks
Cole Gautsche and Clayton Mitchem, he completed 6-of-13 passes for 63 yards and
one touchdown. He carried the ball 20 times for 117 yards, a 5.85 average.
At Goddard, Vega led the
Rockets to two Class 4A state titles and was an All-State selection. In two
seasons at NMMI, he threw for 5,648 yards and 50 touchdowns.
Vega, listed as 6-foot-1 and
193 pounds, will be a senior this fall.
