By T.J. Wilham
Albuquerque Journal
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The last officer to speak with Tiffany Toribio before her son’s death has been “beating himself up” since then, wondering if he could have done something to prevent the 3-year-old’s death, police officials said.
“He is heartbroken, because he loves kids,” Albuquerque police Cmdr. Michael Geier said. “He has been racking his brain wondering if he could have done more. There were no red flags for him. She left, and it was a friendly banter.
“He is torn. This is a guy who has dedicated his life to helping others, and to think you had a chance to keep a kid from being killed. How would you feel?”
The encounter between Toribio and Albuquerque police officer Keith R. Newbill occurred at the Coronado Mall substation about seven hours before she is accused of suffocating her son Tyrus at Alvarado Park and burying him underneath a swing.
According to police officials:
Toribio had just been kicked out of her second home in less than a week when she went to the substation about 4:30 p.m. May 12. Once there, she told a civilian police employee that she thought she had a warrant stemming from a traffic citation.
Newbill, who was also working in the substation, overheard the conversation and started to run a warrant check on her.
As he was running the warrant check, Newbill asked Toribio if she had any relatives she could turn the child over to. She became upset but calmed down.
Newbill did not find a warrant on Toribio, but a mall security officer who was nearby, overheard the conversation and checked a court Web site on his cell phone and found the warrant.
Newbill was unable to confirm the warrant when he checked the APD computer system.
After asking Toribio why she wanted to turn herself in - she said she had nowhere else to go - the civilian employee told Toribio to call the state’s Children, Youth and Families Department or any church.
Unable to find the warrant, Newbill told Toribio to go to Metropolitan Court, where she could take care of it.
By then, she was joking with the civilian employee and left laughing, police officials said.
According to court records, a warrant was issued for Toribio’s arrest in September after she failed to pay a $259 fine stemming from a citation she received for not having auto insurance. Police officials said officers have to check three computer systems to do a complete warrant check. One of those systems was down when Newbill tried to run the check.
But Chief Ray Schultz said Thursday that it wouldn’t have mattered if Newbill had found the warrant. He said Newbill would most likely have told Toribio to go to Metro Court or possibly have given her a ride there to take care of her fine.
Schultz said officers rarely arrest people on minor traffic warrants.
The chief also stood by Newbill, saying the officer did nothing wrong, because there were no signs indicating that Tyrus Toribio had been abused.
“This was not a child who looked like he had been abused,” Schultz said. “This is a child who looked like he had been taken care of.”
Schultz said Toribio could have left her son at the police station if she was concerned about him, something he said has been done before.
“Nobody is responsible for what happened other than Tiffany Toribio,” the chief said.
Schultz also pointed out that Toribio knew how to get access to state services. She had received thousands of dollars in state-funded child care for two years, according documents provided by the Police Department.
Newbill is a retired police officer who came back to the department. He has spent several years working as a school resource officer and is a father.
In other developments from Thursday:
Toribio was wearing nice clothes, makeup and had cash when she was arrested, police said. They said she “had moved on with her life.”
Investigators said they had to use a handprint off a birthday card to identify Tyrus Toribio’s body. They said the body, which had been in hot sand for two days, was badly decomposed.
Copyright 2009 Albuquerque Journal