State of New Mexico, Plaintiff-Appellee v. Nathaniel Duran, Defendant-Appellant

Summary

The court affirmed Defendant’s first-degree murder conviction because the victim’s multiple stab wounds, prolonged struggle, attempted escape, and Defendant’s statements supported a finding of deliberate intent. It reversed the tampering-with-evidence conviction because the State presented no evidence that Defendant actively destroyed or hid physical evidence or intended to disrupt the investigation. The court held that the prosecutor’s questioning of Defendant about whether other witnesses were lying was improper, but the unpreserved misconduct did not constitute fundamental error because Defendant had initiated comments about false accusations and the questioning did not make the trial fundamentally unfair.