ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (KRQE) – An Albuquerque man who has a history of selling drugs on the streets of Albuquerque won’t be spending any time behind bars even after he violated his probation. Thomas Griffin has had two drug trafficking arrests since 2021 and pled guilty to drug trafficking and received 5 years of supervised probation. His probation was violated immediately after with a domestic violence charge. Since the victim would not cooperate with the state, it was dropped, and his probation was reinstated. So Griffin has not served prison time.
Law enforcement and our district attorney are cracking down on drug crimes in the city, but Griffin’s case, the district attorney’s office said, showed how sometimes the court system works against them. “We want to make sure that we’re doing our best in this office to hold people accountable for following court orders too often, unfortunately, and we see warrants for people’s arrest out right now. People do not have respect for the courts,” said Sam Bregman, Bernalillo County District Attorney.
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DA Bregman said probation violations are not uncommon. “The community is frustrated by these kinds of things when someone is given an opportunity not to be incarcerated, and then they don’t take that opportunity to the contrary, they violate the terms of their probation. It’s very frustrating.”
Now, even though the domestic violence charge was dropped, it can be re-filed later. It was Judge Brett Loveless who signed off on the plea deal. Court records show that Griffin has one other case of domestic violence.
News 13 reached out to Albuquerque police for an interview but did not hear back. APD recently released numbers showing it has increased drug arrests by 154% from this time last year.
