Welcome to CASA

Court Appointed Special Advocates
First Judicial District, New Mexico

Serving Santa Fe, Rio Arriba, and Los Alamos Counties

In 2007 in northern New Mexico, 1,179 reports of abuse and neglect of children were investigated, resulting in over 281 child victims, approximately 40% of them under the age of 5. These small victims suddenly found themselves without a home, among strangers. The problem is so serious that in 2005 Governor Richardson proclaimed April as New Mexico Child Abuse Prevention and Awareness Month.

Although the numbers are disheartening, the Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) program of the First Judicial District has been helping to make a difference since 1995. We train, support and promote volunteers from Santa Fe, Rio Arriba, and Los Alamos counties to speak for the best interest of these children in court in order to help them reach safe, permanent homes.

CASA volunteers watch over and advocate for these abused and neglected children to make sure they don’t get lost in the overburdened legal system or languish in an inappropriate group or foster home. Recognized in 2005 with a Legislative Memorial for ten years of service, CASA’s 90+ volunteers annually represent approximately 260 children from 150 families in our three-county area.

"You go into a court room and you will see lawyers who know the law and have dozens of kids' files, or you have social workers who know the regulations and have dozens of kids' files.  But if a CASA volunteer is in the room, you will see they have just one file, and what they know is that one child.  And that can make all the difference to a judge's decision regarding how the rest of that child's life is going to go."   Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and bestselling author Anna Quindlen on CBS' "The Early Show"