Albuquerque Homeless Citations Have Surged Regardless of Mayor’s Rhetoric — ProPublica

Throughout his reelection marketing campaign final fall, the mayor of Albuquerque, New Mexico, criticized his challenger for suggesting the town ought to get more durable on the homeless inhabitants. Such an strategy can be merciless, Tim Keller mentioned throughout a televised debate with former County Sheriff Darren White.

Town clears encampments and offers individuals citations “on a regular basis,” mentioned Keller, who defeated White to win a 3rd time period. However “this downside is complicated and you can’t dumb it right down to arresting individuals,” he mentioned. “You merely can not arrest your means out of this downside whether or not you need to or not.”

Regardless of his rhetoric, a ProPublica evaluation discovered that below Keller’s management, Albuquerque has more and more criminalized conduct related to homelessness, inflicting a rising variety of individuals on the streets to be arrested and jailed.

In 2025, individuals have been charged 1,256 occasions for obstructing sidewalks, practically six occasions the variety of circumstances within the earlier eight years mixed. Greater than 3,000 trespassing expenses have been handed out final 12 months, the best for any 12 months since 2017. And circumstances of illegal tenting elevated to 704 from 113 the 12 months earlier than, in keeping with beforehand unreported county information supplied to ProPublica by the New Mexico Administrative Workplace of the Courts.

Lately, a majority of those circumstances, as soon as they have been adjudicated, have been dismissed. However not with out penalties: Every quotation lists a court docket date, which, if missed, can result in a bench warrant and arrest.

And that’s usually what has occurred.

Over the previous 4 years, the variety of bookings in Bernalillo County’s jail labeled as homeless or “transient” has skyrocketed — to just about 12,000 in 2025, from 3,670 in 2022. In current months, the share of individuals booked who’re transient made up about 49% of the jail’s inhabitants, in keeping with a ProPublica evaluation.

This has occurred as the common each day inhabitants on the jail from July 2024 by way of June 2025 reached its highest level in a decade. On some days final 12 months, the Bernalillo County Metropolitan Detention Heart held extra homeless individuals than the largest native shelter.

Town’s homeless inhabitants has greater than doubled from 2022 to 2025, whereas the rise in homeless individuals jailed by the county has greater than tripled throughout the identical time interval. Police and court docket data and interviews with homeless individuals present the rise of their incarceration is primarily pushed by the cascading results of repeatedly citing people who find themselves experiencing homelessness.

In an interview with ProPublica, Keller echoed his rivalry from the controversy that citations and arrests usually are not an answer to homelessness. Nonetheless, he defended the actions police have taken. “What we’re doing is following the letter of the legislation. There are far more punitive issues that I’m certain lots of people would need, that we don’t do as a result of they’re inappropriate,” he mentioned. 

In a press release, a spokesperson for Keller famous that different cities “depend on speedy arrests, blanket sweeps with out service connection or prison penalties with out providing alternate options.” Town points three citations earlier than an arrest is made, the spokesperson mentioned. (Individuals dwelling outdoors instructed ProPublica they’ve been taken to jail with out first receiving three citations.) 

When ProPublica identified that citations can result in arrests and jail time, Keller acknowledged that jail “isn’t the answer.” However, he mentioned, individuals name the town and ask that legal guidelines be enforced.

Lately, U.S. cities, going through file numbers of individuals on the road, have adopted extra legal guidelines concentrating on them. In 2024, after the U.S. Supreme Court docket dominated that cities might implement bans towards sleeping outdoors, greater than 150 municipalities nationwide, together with Albuquerque, both handed new legal guidelines prohibiting public tenting or ramped up enforcement of current legal guidelines.

President Donald Trump has endorsed this strategy, calling for federal grants to be prioritized for cities that implement bans on “city tenting and loitering.”

The emphasis on enforcement has come regardless of proof that such citations and arrests are expensive. For instance, Bernalillo County spends about $169 per evening to jail inmates with out important medical or psychological well being wants, in keeping with a county spokesperson. The fee will increase for individuals with extreme medical ($250 a day) and psychological well being (about $450 a day) wants, a spokesperson mentioned. 

By comparability, housing a person within the metropolis’s year-round emergency shelter prices $44 an evening.

Tony Robinson, a political science professor on the College of Colorado who has studied tenting bans, mentioned the share of homeless inmates in Bernalillo County’s jail is “unusually excessive” — even at a time when cities are ramping up enforcement. ProPublica discovered that jails in equally sized counties, together with San Francisco and Pasco County, Florida, have decrease charges of incarceration for people who find themselves marked homeless.

Citing people who find themselves homeless can land them in jail as a result of some lack cellphones or an tackle the place they will obtain notices by mail. This can be a barrier to showing in court docket, resulting in a warrant for his or her arrest, he mentioned. “Easy citations result in jail time and arrest by a predictable path.” 

ProPublica reviewed greater than 100 circumstances and interviewed two dozen individuals experiencing homelessness in Albuquerque about their encounters with police. Practically everybody ProPublica spoke to had been charged for a criminal offense related to homelessness. They mentioned they really feel singled out by the police: Officers contact them incessantly and challenge citations, which might result in warrants. When officers see they’ve warrants, they will take them to jail.

Natalie Rankin, a 45-year-old homeless lady in Albuquerque, was charged 12 occasions during the last 12 months for a wide range of crimes, together with blocking the sidewalk, public tenting and prison trespassing. She spent an evening in jail in August after an officer observed that she had a warrant for her arrest.

“I don’t do something greater than get little warrants for not displaying up in court docket,” she mentioned in August. 

Rankin has already been charged a minimum of seven occasions in 2026 and spent a minimum of in the future in jail.

Since Keller took workplace 9 years in the past, Albuquerque has spent a minimum of $100 million to develop the town’s Gateway system, which incorporates shelter for households and adults, a 50-person remedy program, and a spot the place individuals are supervised by medical professionals as they withdraw from medicine or alcohol.

“We’re one of many few cities who actually has been proactive about constructing a brand new system,” Keller mentioned. “It wants tons of labor and tons of assist, however we’ve a minimum of constructed one thing that has gotten 1,000 individuals off the road.”

In the meantime, the town’s homeless inhabitants, which was a minimum of 2,960 final 12 months, exceeds the shelters’ capability even with the expansions. Keller has additionally develop into much less tolerant of encampments in public areas like parks and sidewalks, vowing to not permit “tent cities.”

In textual content messages reported in 2024 by the information group Metropolis Desk ABQ, Keller requested then-police Chief Harold Medina to develop a plan to deal with the “rising disaster.” Medina texted again a plan to “hammer the unhoused.” (After the texts have been printed, a spokesperson for Keller mentioned, “We proceed to steadiness implementing legal guidelines towards criminal activity to maintain our communities protected, and offering sources for individuals experiencing homelessness to each get them linked to companies.”) 

Town has been accused of breaking the legislation because it carries out the crackdown.

In 2022, present and former homeless individuals sued Albuquerque in state district court docket over its concentrating on of encampments, alleging the town “criminalizes their standing as homeless,” in keeping with court docket paperwork. The category-action lawsuit is pending.

A 2024 ProPublica investigation discovered metropolis employees routinely discarded the belongings of homeless individuals as they cleared encampments, violating a court docket order and metropolis coverage. Some individuals instructed ProPublica in current interviews that metropolis employees proceed to throw away their belongings, and police are issuing citations extra incessantly.

Officers haven’t focused people who find themselves homeless, Medina mentioned in an interview in December. The rise in citations and arrests for crimes related to homelessness are the results of a broader crime-fighting surge, he mentioned.

Final April, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham deployed the Nationwide Guard to help Albuquerque police, citing the “fentanyl epidemic and rising violent juvenile crime.” The Nationwide Guard was additionally to supply humanitarian and medical help in components of the town frequented by people who find themselves homeless.

“It’s vital that we don’t categorize this as, ‘We’re doing an initiative on the unhoused,’” mentioned Medina, who retired on the finish of final 12 months. “We’re doing an initiative throughout the board.” 

Metropolis statistics present, nevertheless, that the largest soar in arrests from 2024 to 2025 was for misdemeanor warrants, the varieties described by lots of the individuals ProPublica interviewed. Arrests related to misdemeanor warrants have been up 72%.

Priscilla Montano, 67, typically stays below a bridge close to downtown Albuquerque. She mentioned metropolis employees, who’re often accompanied by police, go to the spot a minimum of 5 days every week to inform individuals to maneuver their belongings. In July, Montano was charged thrice for illegal tenting and obstructing sidewalks. In September, she was incarcerated for a day on the identical expenses. There’s a warrant for her arrest associated to a separate violation from September.

Montano mentioned every time she goes to jail her belongings are thrown away. She’s misplaced her wedding ceremony ring and property she must survive.

Lisandra Tonkin, who leads a crew on the New Mexico Coalition to Finish Homelessness that helps individuals discover housing, mentioned the crackdown has made it tougher to remain in contact with the individuals they’re making an attempt to assist as a result of they’re “consistently moved” by sweeps and jail stays.

Metropolis officers say they first supply sources, together with a spot in a shelter. Tonkin mentioned some individuals are reluctant to simply accept as a result of they’ve been traumatized by their experiences in shelters, like being assaulted or having their belongings stolen. The supply typically comes with necessities they received’t settle for, like giving up a pet or separating from a companion. 

“So what’s the resolution of the place to maneuver them? I believe quite a lot of occasions the selection is shelter or jail,” she mentioned.

The end result, in keeping with Medina, the previous chief, is that the Metropolitan Detention Heart has develop into the state’s largest “psychological well being facility.”

“I don’t suppose it’s superb for these people to all the time find yourself in jail, 100%, however there’s restricted sources and talent to get individuals to these sources below our present system,” he mentioned.

Individuals who have acquired citations or who’ve been arrested instructed ProPublica that the town’s supply is both a mattress in a shelter that was the county jail or nothing in any respect.

One night in December, Tiffany Leger sat on a sidewalk in northwest Albuquerque listening to a digital assembly by way of headphones. Leger, who spent two years on the streets however now has a house, nonetheless visits buddies who dwell outdoors and shares cellphone numbers for native organizations the place they will search assist. As she listened to the digital assembly, police approached and instructed her she was being detained for tenting, noting there was a tent close by. The officers issued a quotation.

Through the years, Leger has heard from buddies that if police supply sources, it’s normally a card with outdated data on shelters within the metropolis or a mattress within the shelter on the outskirts of city, she mentioned.

Leger mentioned that normally police strategy individuals who look homeless and examine for warrants, typically resulting in an arrest. 

For many years, Peter Cubra has monitored the town’s remedy of homeless individuals. Cubra was concerned in a 1995 lawsuit by which Jimmy McClendon, an inmate on the Bernalillo County Detention Heart, sued Albuquerque and the county over circumstances there, together with overcrowding. The lawsuit additionally alleged that police have been jailing individuals, together with those that have been homeless, for nonviolent misdemeanors. 

A metropolis settlement within the lawsuit directed police to challenge citations for nonviolent misdemeanors, when attainable, as a substitute of constructing arrests on the spot. 

Cubra mentioned that in 2020, he began noticing “slow-motion arrests,” the place police challenge citations understanding that an individual experiencing homelessness received’t get the notices from court docket. Police, he mentioned, would revisit the identical location, demand identification and run warrant checks, ultimately choosing individuals up on warrants from the earlier citations or expenses.

Janus Herrera, a neighborhood advocate and volunteer, mentioned individuals have instructed her they miss court docket dates as a result of they misplaced paperwork stating the place and when to look in court docket that they acquired throughout an encampment sweep.

“Individuals are already strained to a breaking level,” she mentioned. “You retain including increasingly on prime of that.”

ProPublica’s evaluate of 100 randomly chosen circumstances for prison trespassing from 2025 confirmed 67% of individuals had missed their court docket dates, resulting in an arrest warrant. 

The general public ProPublica interviewed who had gone to jail mentioned they have been held in a single day and launched again to the streets with a pending case. A current examine helps their claims: From 2024 to 2025, the variety of individuals jailed for lower than a day elevated by 131%, in accordance to a knowledge evaluation by the Heart for Utilized Analysis and Evaluation on the College of New Mexico.

If an individual doesn’t attend subsequent court docket dates, their case may end up in extra warrants. The following time they encounter police, they are often arrested once more.

Cubra mentioned as a substitute of repeatedly citing and arresting individuals, some communities designate locations for individuals to “informally however intentionally” sleep outside with out harassment. (A church opened such an area in Albuquerque final 12 months with capability for 10 tents.) However in Albuquerque, Cubra mentioned, the arrests “have continued and accelerated” over the previous 12 months, which he known as “shameful.”

“Our metropolis is knowingly saying, ‘We received’t allow you to sleep outside,” Cubra mentioned. “We all know there is no such thing as a place so that you can sleep indoors, and we’re going to maintain arresting you and harassing you for one thing that’s unavoidable and intrinsic to only current.’”

Methodology

ProPublica obtained court docket information on three expenses incessantly related to homelessness: prison trespassing, illegal obstruction of sidewalks and illegal tenting. In some circumstances, a single cost appeared a number of occasions within the information. In these circumstances, we included solely the newest end result related to the costs. We additionally excluded circumstances marked as transferred throughout the court docket system, to keep away from double-counting. As a lot as attainable, we excluded circumstances the place it was clear the costs weren’t immediately related to homelessness — for instance, home violence and driving below the affect.

The court docket information didn’t embody housing standing. The county jail tracks whether or not an individual has everlasting housing throughout reserving and marks an individual “transient.” The court docket information didn’t checklist the legislation enforcement company that issued the cost. However jail information exhibits the Albuquerque Police Division was answerable for 75% of the homeless bookings from 2020 to 2025. 

ProPublica interviewed 24 people who find themselves homeless about being charged with crimes related to their housing standing. We independently verified their circumstances by way of court docket data.