Alamogordo Police Department Rises as Sheriff’s Office Faces Crisis of Confidence

As 2025 creeps into the 4th quarter, the Alamogordo Police Department has emerged as an exemplar of municipal policing in southern New Mexico. This expansion of public trust comes about all the while the Otero County Sheriff’s Office grapples with reputational fallout and operational fractures.

Under Chief David Kunihiro the APD reputation has grown by leaps and bounds with strong support from the Acting City Manager, Dr Stephanie Hernandez, and the City Commission. APD’s investments in personnel, training, civilianized services, and public transparency have produced measurable gains in recruitment, response capacity, and neighborhood trust. At the same time, the June 25, 2024 fatal shooting of 17‑year‑old Elijah Hadley and the breakdown of the Tularosa Basin Emergency Response Center have clouded Sheriff David Black’s reformist legacy and strained countywide emergency coordination.

Chief David Kunihiro and APD Exceptionalism

Chief David Kunihiro has steered APD toward a community‑centered model that emphasizes accountability and capacity-building. Key pillars of the department’s recent progress include:

Compensation and recruitment. City-driven salary increases and targeted incentives for bilingual skills and higher education have reduced vacancies, attracted lateral hires, and stabilized patrol staffing.

Training upgrades. Expanded in‑service programs now prioritize de‑escalation, mental‑health incident response, crisis intervention, and cultural competency, with measurable declines in routine use‑of‑force complaints.

Civilianization through Community Service Officers. The APD Community Service Officer program places non‑sworn personnel on traffic, outreach, and non‑emergency duties, increasing public contact and freeing sworn officers for critical incidents.

Transparency and engagement. Regular crime‑data releases weekly to local press, public forums, and bilingual outreach have narrowed information gaps and increased civic participation in policing decisions.

These reforms have translated into improved response times, stronger community familiarity with officers, and higher local ratings for transparency and effectiveness, positioning APD as one of the state’s leading municipal departments.

The Elijah Hadley Case: A Catalyst for Countywide Scrutiny

The shooting of Elijah Hadley on June 25, 2024 became a flashpoint across Otero County. Hadley, a 17‑year‑old member of the Mescalero Apache Tribe, was encountered during a welfare check and was reportedly holding an airsoft pistol when he was shot by an Otero County deputy. Eyewitness accounts and community advocates asserted that Hadley complied with commands and was not an imminent lethal threat when multiple rounds were fired.

Public reaction was immediate and sustained:

Weekly protests and vigils demanded transparency and independent investigation.

Tribal leaders and civil‑rights groups sought federal and state oversight of the inquiry, the DA referred the investigation to the DA's Office in Albuquerque which is now leading a prosecution against the deputy involved.

Calls for accountability extended beyond the deputy involved to questions about departmental culture, oversight, and ties between county officials.

Legally and politically, the case generated prosecutorial review, civil claims, and intense media scrutiny. For Sheriff David Black, who campaigned on transparency and cleaning up county law enforcement, the Hadley shooting proved an acute test of those promises. Critics point to the sheriff’s uneven public communication, reluctance to attend some public meetings, and confrontations with media outlets as factors that deepened distrust rather than stemming it.

Tularosa Basin Emergency Response Center Collapse

The Tularosa Basin Emergency Response Center was conceived as a unified dispatch and coordination hub to improve interoperability between city and county responders

Its failures became emblematic of deeper governance and oversight problems.

City withdrawal. In 2023 the City of Alamogordo pulled out of the joint venture, citing lack of transparency, disputes over budgetary control, and operational governance concerns. The city concluded that participation no longer delivered the promised local control or clarity of oversight.

Operational consequences. The collapse resulted in fragmented dispatch arrangements, reduced interoperability, and increased reliance on workarounds for mutual aid—diminishing the efficiency of cross‑jurisdictional responses in major incidents.

Oversight questions. Observers and municipal officials criticized county leadership for failing to provide clear governance, consistent reporting, and accountable fiscal management of the center. Those lapses became part of the narrative that the sheriff’s administration had not delivered the institutional reforms it promised.

The dispatch breakup elevated practical public‑safety concerns in residents’ minds and framed the Hadley case within a broader pattern of county management failures in the public imagination.

How Black’s Reputation Shifted from Reform to Controversy

Sheriff David Black entered office pledging transparency, anti‑corruption measures, and improved county policing. As his term reaches its final year, several dynamics have eroded that mandate:

High‑profile incident management. The Hadley shooting shifted public attention from incremental reforms to a single, emotionally charged event that called into question use‑of‑force policies and oversight rigor.

Communication and media posture. The sheriff’s limited public engagement during the immediate aftermath, refusals of some interview requests, and tense exchanges with local broadcasters have been read as defensive and have amplified calls for outside investigation.

Institutional flashpoints. The loss of the Tularosa Basin dispatch partnership and allegations about county political entanglements have reinforced perceptions that promised structural reforms remain incomplete.

These developments have weakened the narrative of progress the sheriff had cultivated and strengthened demands for independent oversight, clearer accountability mechanisms, and leadership change at the county level.

NMSP Redeployments and Local Pressure

The New Mexico State Police remain a critical statewide resource, but strategic redeployments to high‑crime northern urban areas have reduced consistent district‑level presence in rural southern counties like Otero. That redeployment dynamic has three effects locally:

Increased municipal burden. With fewer state troopers routinely available, municipalities such as Alamogordo have absorbed more day‑to‑day response and investigative work.

Heightened expectations for APD. Residents looking for dependable, transparent policing have turned more attention to the municipal force, amplifying APD’s visibility and perceived performance.

Strained mutual aid. Reduced NMSP presence complicates county‑level surge capacity and specialized support, making effective local interagency collaboration more urgent.

APD’s stronger local footing has partly offset these strains, but the broader manpower and redeployment realities underscore why municipal excellence has become so salient.

Comparative Assessment: Transparency and Effectiveness

Alamogordo Police Department. Ranks highest in reputation of any local law enforcement agency due to transparency and effectiveness due to concrete personnel investments, CSO deployment, expanded training, and a visible community engagement strategy led by Chief Kunihiro. These changes have produced better staffing stability, improved public contact, and stronger local trust.

New Mexico State Police. Strong institutional capability and specialized capacity at the state level but uneven local presence caused by redeployment to northern hotspots reduces perceived effectiveness in rural districts.

Otero County Sheriff’s Office. Reputation and perceived effectiveness have declined significantly amid the Hadley shooting, the dispatch authority collapse, and contentious public communications; those events place OCSO behind most peer sheriff’s offices in countywide trust metrics.

What This Means for Residents and Policy

APD’s model demonstrates that municipal investments, strong non-biased oversight by city commissioners and the city manager, fair pay, excellence in training, civilian roles, and open communication can deliver tangible gains in local trust and operational effectiveness.

Conversely, the Hadley shooting and the Tularosa Basin dispatch partnership collapse illustrate how single incidents and failed interagency ventures can rapidly erode institutional legitimacy.

Policy implications include:

Renewed calls for independent oversight of use‑of‑force incidents and non-biased independent county governance.

Urgent need for transparent governance structures for any future regional dispatch or mutual‑aid arrangements.

Consideration of sustainable funding and staffing commitments for rural policing to offset the impacts of state redeployments.

Looking Ahead

The coming year will test whether APD’s gains are durable and whether the Otero County Sheriff's Department and Commission can rebuild public trust. Voters and civic leaders will watch prosecutions, investigations, and any renewed efforts to restore regional emergency coordination.

For now, Alamogordo’s police force projects confidence and capability, while the sheriff’s office faces a political and managerial crossroads shaped by the Hadley case and the breakdown of regional cooperation and a complicated Sherrifs race with accusations of dirty deeds already being lodged. Stay tuned to AlamogordoTownNews.org for additional updates as they emerge.

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