Griffith calls for Alexander to be fired over detention fallout

For­mer Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Gary Grif­fith is call­ing for the im­me­di­ate re­moval of the Min­is­ter of Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty fol­low­ing the re­lease of in­di­vid­u­als who were de­tained for weeks un­der Pre­ven­tive De­ten­tion Or­ders.

In a state­ment, Grif­fith said the de­ci­sion to de­tain the in­di­vid­u­als, fol­lowed by the or­der for their re­lease, rep­re­sent­ed “to­tal in­com­pe­tence at the high­est lev­el” and warned that the mat­ter could cost tax­pay­ers mil­lions of dol­lars.

Grif­fith crit­i­cised the Min­is­ter’s de­ci­sion to au­tho­rise the de­ten­tions based on “cred­i­ble in­tel­li­gence” with­out charges be­ing laid, ar­gu­ing that the in­for­ma­tion should have been de­vel­oped in­to ev­i­dence ca­pa­ble of sup­port­ing crim­i­nal charges.

He said the Gov­ern­ment’s re­liance on in­tel­li­gence in the ab­sence of ev­i­dence raised se­ri­ous con­cerns about cit­i­zens’ right to free­dom.

“This is tan­ta­mount to what takes place in a po­lice state or a dic­ta­to­r­i­al coun­try,” Grif­fith said.

He al­so ac­cused the Min­is­ter of mis­lead­ing the pub­lic by sug­gest­ing the doc­u­ments re­lat­ing to the de­ten­tion or­ders were sim­ply pre­sent­ed for his sig­na­ture, say­ing the Min­is­ter had the sole au­thor­i­ty un­der the law to ap­prove the or­ders.

“He is not a rub­ber stamp,” Grif­fith said.

Grif­fith claimed the sit­u­a­tion could re­sult in le­gal costs amount­ing to tens of mil­lions of dol­lars and said tax­pay­ers should not be the on­ly ones to bear the con­se­quences.

“The con­se­quences must not be borne sole­ly through the pock­ets of tax­pay­ers,” he said.

He al­so com­pared the sit­u­a­tion to the 2002 Brent Thomas mat­ter un­der the for­mer PNM ad­min­is­tra­tion, where he said gov­ern­ment ac­tions con­tributed to pub­lic back­lash against that ad­min­is­tra­tion.

Grif­fith main­tained that the use of “cred­i­ble in­tel­li­gence” as the ba­sis for de­ten­tion was dan­ger­ous be­cause it re­lied on the judge­ment of an in­di­vid­ual min­is­ter.

“A head must roll,” he said, re­peat­ing his call for the Min­is­ter of Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty to be fired.