Ex-official whose home was shot up ‘not going to live in fear’
(NewsNation) — Debbie O’Malley was sleeping in her Albuquerque home in early December when she was “jolted awake” by what she thought was someone banging on the door. It turned out to be bullets striking her house.
O’Malley is one of five elected officials who’ve had their homes or office shot at since the beginning of December. Police in Albuquerque are investigating the shootings, and the city’s police chief said Friday that some of them are connected.
More than a dozen bullets hit O’Malley’s home Dec. 11, when she was serving as a Bernalillo County commissioner. O’Malley spoke about the experience Friday on “Rush Hour.”
“We were jolted awake by what we thought was somebody banging on our door,” O’Malley said. “We didn’t realize that our wall was damaged until the next day and we saw these divot-sized holes in our wall.”
The Albuquerque Police Department says the first shooting happened Dec. 4 at the home of another commissioner, Adriann Barboa. A week later on Dec. 10, the campaign office of Attorney General Raul Torrez was shot at, and O’Malley’s house was targeted the next day.
The fourth shooting was on Tuesday at the home of State Sen. Linda Lopez, and on Thursday the office of State Sen. Moe Maestas was shot at.
Police on Friday confirmed that at least some of the shootings are connected. Albuquerque Police Chief Harold Medina confirmed Friday on “Dan Abrams Live” that at least some of the shootings are connected. He had noted in a news conference Thursday that all of the shootings happened at buildings either owned or rented by Democrats, NewsNation affiliate KRQE reported.
“We’re not going to get into specifics about which cases are related, but our detectives are working around the clock and we’re hoping to have more answers in the near future,” Medina said Friday.
Police are still collecting and analyzing evidence, and Medina said it’s difficult at this point to determine any specific motivation.
“We haven’t gotten any kind of information from these individuals that they are being targeted for a specific reason,” Medina said. “We have a lot of evidence that we are still sifting through, and we are hoping to have some results from that evidence back over the weekend.”
Despite the act of violence she was subjected to, O’Malley said she can’t live in fear.
“I was born in this community, I’ve lived in this neighborhood for a long time, and I just have to get out, I have to go around,” O’Malley said. “I think it’s helpful to have more security cameras and things like that … but I’m not going to live in fear.”