NM family files suit over son’s 2008 death
The family of a San Felipe Pueblo man fatally struck by a car while crossing a Santa Fe street in 2008 has filed a wrongful death lawsuit.
The suit was filed Wednesday in New Mexico District Court on behalf of 46-year-old William Tenorio. It names Carlos Fierro and the owners of 2 downtown Santa Fe bars where the 37-year-old attorney and his passenger drank alcohol in the hours preceding the Nov. 26, 2008 accident.
The suit claims employees of the bars should have known Fierro was intoxicated. It seeks damages for Tenorio’s medical care and burial and for his family’s pain and suffering. Investigators say Fierro’s blood-alcohol level was .21 percent, more than 2 1/2 times the legal driving limit in New Mexico.
Fierro was sentenced to seven years in prison in a November plea deal after being convicted for vehicular homicide. His passenger, former state police Sgt. Alfred Lovato, is scheduled to stand trial in January on charges of vehicular homicide and leaving the scene of a fatal accident.