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Marc Schiff's attorney says the only time his client used his architect firm to steal money from the state was when he inflated and falsified invoices for construction of Bernalillo County's Metropolitan Court.

But suspicious circumstances surrounding the firm's selection to design Do¤a Ana County's new building make me skeptical.

In the Bernalillo County case, Schiff and two others have pleaded guilty to conspiracy and mail fraud in what prosecutors call a complex scheme to bilk taxpayers out of $4.2 million. Four others, including former Senate President Manny Aragon, are charged in the case.

At the time of his crimes, Schiff was president of Design Collaborative Southwest. The firm has since severed its ties with him and renamed itself Studio Southwest.

It was still DCSW when it bid in early 2003 on the contract to design the $20-million Do¤a Ana County Government Center, according to articles I wrote for the Las Cruces Sun while working there as a reporter. As is standard, a committee ranked the bidders in April 2003 based on criteria listed in the request for proposals. DCSW scored last among the four.

When commissioners met a month later to select an architect, they decided to disregard the committee's work and ignore the criteria bidders had been told would be considered, the Sun articles said.

Instead of a voice vote, commissioners voted on paper ballots. After collecting them, the county manager said at the public meeting that three of five picked DCSW, but didn't say how each commissioner voted.

Then the paper ballots vanished.

It was one of a number of suspicious situations in Do¤a Ana County government that caught the attention of the state auditor in 2004. A special audit found widespread problems, including three findings referred to prosecutors - one of them a violation of the procurement code in the selection of DCSW.

The audit states that commissioners "may have intentionally violated the procurement code" because of the suspicious nature of DCSW's selection. In addition, the paper-ballot vote violated the state Open Meetings Act.

At the helm of county government at the time was former Commissioner Gilbert Apodaca, who was accused of bribery twice during his tenure. An FBI investigation never resulted in criminal charges.

Apodaca has repeatedly denied wrongdoing. Schiff's attorney, Joseph Riggs, told me federal investigators examined a number of DCSW projects, including, he believes, Do¤a Ana County's, and found "no proof of any misconduct" in instances other than the metro court situation because "there was none."

Spokesmen for the FBI and U.S. Attorney"s Office declined to comment, but the prosecutor on the Metro Court case has said the investigation is ongoing.

If they haven't already, federal investigators should look into the Doña Ana County situation. The Sun's reports say the audit was passed around by prosecutors and sat, untouched, on a number of desks for a year and a half before the Santa Fe district attorney announced in 2006 that no charges would be filed. His office found only misdemeanors, and the statute of limitations had expired.

But state investigators only considered whether there was a procurement code violation - not why commissioners might have intentionally violated the code. It's time the feds did just that.

Haussamen is an independent, online political journalist based in Las Cruces. His work can be found at: http://nmpolitics.net