Lisa Torraco and Kari Brandenburg contested each other's qualifications for district attorney in a debate at the UNM School of Law on Thursday.
Torraco, a Republican campaigning against the incumbent Brandenburg, said that instead of giving a campaign speech she would get right to the issues.
"Since this is a group of lawyers, I would like to talk to you all about the policy and procedures and how I would like to change things as district attorney," Torraco said.
"We have a serious problem in this county of serious violent offenders being released and causing more crime."
Torraco said she would introduce a preliminary hearing system to speed the trial process.
"What is currently being done in the district attorney's office is a grand jury," she said. "I would like to use preliminary hearings, because they are a highly effective way of cutting crime."
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Torraco said the preliminary trial would be held within 10 days of a defendant's arrest.
"This system creates swift justice," she said. "What we have now is a system where the grand jury is done six months or eight months after the time the person is arrested."
Torraco said she also plans to help UNM law students.
"I would like to reinstitute the clinical law program," she said. "I want to offer students as much experience as possible in prosecuting cases in the D.A.'s office."
In her opening statement, Brandenburg said she should be re-elected because she has a lifetime of law experience.
"I grew up in the courtroom, watching my father as we worked in the D.A.'s office," she said. "As a little girl, I would go through my father's briefcase as he went into his room and changed clothes."
Brandenburg said she has made great improvements to the D.A's office during her eight years there, presiding over decreases in crime and high conviction rates.
"The fact that I have the endorsements of absolutely all the local law enforcement groups indicates my relationship with law enforcement," Brandenburg said. "Our district attorney's office has risen to challenges and done things that no other office has done in the country."
James Dory-Garduno, a third-year law student, put the debate together and created terms to which both candidates' campaigns agreed.
Scott Stromberg, a second-year law student, said there was no clear winner in the debate.
"I think that they both had some legitimate points," he said.
Stromberg said Brandenburg has been doing a decent job as D.A. and that he was interested in how Torraco would implement different systems that could work better.
David Gordon, a third-year law student, said the candidates have different ideas of how to run the D.A.'s office but that they also spent a lot of time in the debate making personal attacks.
"The debate was a lot more adversarial than I thought it would be," Gordon said. "I didn't think that the candidates would be making such harsh allegations towards each other."
Gordon said he will have to consider carefully who he will vote for.
"I'm not sure that the district attorney is the only person responsible for the amount of crime in a city," he said. "I am a little concerned, because I do think that Albuquerque is a more dangerous city than it should be."
