2023 New Mexico Statutes › Chapter 32A - Children's Code › Article 3A - Voluntary Placement and Family Services › Section 32A-3A-11 - Emergency placement; criminal history record check.

A. In an emergency placement situation, when a child must be placed in a home due to the absence of parents or custodians, the department or a criminal justice agency shall perform a federal name-based criminal history record check of each adult residing in the home. The results of the name-based check shall be provided to the department, and, within fifteen days from the date that the name-based check was conducted, the department shall provide a complete set of each adult resident's fingerprints to the department of public safety for immediate submission to the federal bureau of investigation. The department of public safety shall positively identify the fingerprint subject, if possible, and forward the fingerprints to the federal bureau of investigation within fifteen calendar days from the date that the name-based search was conducted. The child shall be removed from the home immediately if any adult resident fails to provide fingerprints or written permission to perform a federal criminal history record check when requested to do so.
B. When placement of a child in a home is denied as a result of a name-based criminal history record check of a resident and the resident contests that denial, the resident shall, within five business days, submit to the department a complete set of the resident's fingerprints with written permission allowing the department to forward the fingerprints to the department of public safety for submission to the federal bureau of investigation. The resident shall be entitled to review the information obtained from the resident's criminal history record check if that check was performed using the resident's fingerprints submitted pursuant to this subsection.
C. The department may charge the federal fee for processing a fingerprint-based criminal history record check pursuant to this section. The department of public safety shall not charge a state fee for processing a fingerprint-based criminal history record check pursuant to this section.
D. As used in this section, "emergency placement" refers to those limited instances when the department is placing a child in the home of private individuals, including neighbors, friends or relatives, as a result of sudden unavailability of the child's primary caretaker.
History:
Laws 2013, ch. 50, § 1; 2016, ch. 64, § 1.
ANNOTATIONS
The 2016 amendment,
effective March 7, 2016, required immediate removal of children from emergency placement homes under certain circumstances, and allowed the children, youth and families department to perform criminal history record checks; in Subsection A, after the first occurrence of "the department", deleted "shall request that" and added "or", after "criminal justice agency", added "shall", and after "The child", deleted "may" and added "shall"; in Subsection B, added the last sentence; and in Subsection C, added "The department may charge the federal fee for processing a fingerprint-based criminal history record check pursuant to this section.", after "public safety", deleted "may" and added "shall not", after "charge a", deleted "reasonable" and added "state", and after "record check", added "pursuant to this section".