As far as Alamosa County is concerned, the legal troubles of Clerk and Recorder Mari Felix won’t affect how Alamosa County manages the 2024 election cycle.
Felix, who was appointed Alamosa County Clerk and Recorder in July 2022, was arrested in mid-December 2023 and initially charged with four felonies for complicity in sexual assault on a child and child abuse in a case involving her husband, Martin Felix-Lopez. He was charged with four felonies of sexual assault of a child by one in a position of trust, sexual assault, unlawful sexual contact, and child abuse.
12th Judicial District Attorney Anne Kelly then on Jan. 1 reduced Felix’s charges to just a single count of accessory to crime, a class five felony. At the time of writing, The Citizen has not spoken with Kelly.
Felix is scheduled to make her next court appearance in the case on Feb. 22.
Why it matters: In U.S. elections, the local county clerk and the county clerk and recorder staff play a critical role in both planning for the election and then managing election-day activities. This year, with presidential candidates on the ballot, the stakes are high for all county clerks to run a smooth and secure election.
Felix, who was appointed to the post following the resignation of Nicole Jaramillo, was then elected to a four-year term in 2022. She has not indicated whether she plans to step down in light of the legal case she faces and has not responded to phone messages from The Citizen.
She has reportedly been absent from the county clerk’s office since her arrest. Her attorney, Michael Martin of Broomfield, said that is inaccurate. (Read Martin’s statement HERE.)
Short of a resignation or a recall effort, Felix will remain in the position as her court case unfolds.
“The Clerk and Recorder is not up for election until 2026. As with any elected official the decision to seek re-election or resign from office is an individual one,” said Alamosa County Administrator Roni Wisdom.
Wisdom said the Board of County Commissioners, which includes Lori Laske, Vern Heersink, and Arlan VanRy, remains confident that the county clerk’s staff and election-day volunteers will be able to handle election duties.
“The Board of County Commissioners maintains its confidence in the employees of the office of the Clerk and Recorder and does not anticipate any disruptions to the services provided through that office between now and through the 2024 election cycle,” Wisdom said.
Role secretary of state plays: The Colorado secretary of state is aware of the situation, department spokesperson Jack Todd told The Citizen. The secretary of state has a County Support team that works directly with each of Colorado’s counties throughout an election cycle, he said.
The Colorado secretary of state, currently Jenna Griswold, establishes a detailed calendar with specific deadlines that county clerks and their election teams must adhere to in order for the election to go off smoothly and with voting safety guards in place. The calendar spells out deadlines state political parties must meet, as well as deadlines for voters to make any changes to their voter registration status.
As an example, Jan. 2 was the deadline for “designated election officials to submit security and contingency plans to the Secretary of State for the March 5th Presidential Primary Election.” It was also the deadline “for the Secretary of State to deliver the March 5th Presidential Primary Election ballot order and content to county clerks.”
What’s next: In 2024, Colorado will stage a March 5 presidential primary, a June 25 primary election, and a Nov. 5 general election. In other words, it’s a busy year for county clerks and their election staff who face intense deadline pressure internally and intense scrutiny coming in from the outside.
Nicole Jaramillo when she was county clerk expressed how difficult and challenging she found organizing an election when she first did it for a November 2021 election. Jaramillo had been with the Alamosa County Clerk’s office for 23 years before she became county clerk, yet had not had to work with an election cycle. “I didn’t realize all the steps involved, and what it actually took to run an election and be prepared,” she said at the time.
For the 2021 cycle Alamosa County hired consultant Teak Simonton, a former Eagle County Clerk, to help Jaramillo manage the election process and the deadlines required by the secretary of state’s office.
So far, with County Clerk Mari Felix absent from the office as she deals with her legal challenges, “No deadlines have been missed by Alamosa County,” Todd said.
The legal case: On Wednesday, Jan. 31, Alamosa County Sheriff’s Deputy Sergio Cazares appeared on the witness stand during a preliminary hearing for Felix-Lopez. Cazares stated that he was dispatched to Ortega Middle School on Thursday, Dec. 21, 2023, after a school counselor and principle had spoken with Felix’s child who told investigators about experiencing sexual assault for a number of years by Felix-Lopez.
Felix-Lopez is represented by the Alamosa Public Defender’s Office, which would neither confirm nor deny whether it is also representing Felix.
Cazares stated that the victim said the sexual assault had been occuring for three to four years. The most recent assault happened on the night of Dec. 18, he said.
Later that same day, on Dec. 21, 12th Judicial District Court Judge Crista Newmyer-Olsen signed a probable cause statement for a warrantless arrest for Felix and Felix-Lopez. Felix was arrested just after 4:15 p.m. while leaving work from the county clerk’s office.
In the heavily redacted documents, a pattern of abuse is highlighted. The probable cause statements show that the victim told Cazares that Felix and Felix-Lopez separated in May 2023 after the sexual abuse was revealed to Felix. That separation, the statement says, lasted one day.
According to the updated charge of accessory to crime, “Between May 1, 2023, and Dec. 21, 2023, Maria Felix unlawfully and feloniously rendered assistance to Martin Felix-Lopez, with intent to hinder, delay, or prevent the discovery, detection, apprehension, prosecution, conviction, or punishment of Martin Felix-Lopez for the commission of a crime, knowing that person committed the crime of sexual assault of a child by one in a position of trust/pattern, C.R.S., a class 3, 5, or 5 felony; in violation of section 18-8-105(1),(5), C.R.S.”
According to the Colorado Revised Statutes, “A person is an accessory to crime if, with intent to hinder, delay, or prevent the discovery, detection, apprehension, prosecution, conviction, or punishment of another for the commission of a crime, he renders assistance to such person.”
If found convicted of a class five felony, according to the Colorado Revised Statutes, Felix could face up to three years in prison and fines up to $100,000.
Cazares wrote in his statement, “Mari was informed and advised by [them] of the ongoing sexual abuse and failed to report the crime to law enforcement or remove [them] from the harmful situation at hand.”