The woman killed in a Dec. 14 head-on crash with an ambulance on Interstate 25 can be heard on emergency dispatch recordings arguing with her passenger after leaving a downtown Santa Fe bar less than an hour before her death.

Santa Fe police on Wednesday released a series of recordings of calls related to the collision that killed wrong-way driver Kylene Holmes, 26, of El Paso; severely injured her passenger, Jennifer Michelle Belvin of Oceanside, Calif.; and critically injured Vanessa Carrillo, the 19-year-old certified emergency medical technician who was alone in the ambulance hit by Holmes' Nissan Altima.

"They've just been arguing and they're trying to get in their car and drive away and I just feel that they should not," Shanti Ananda, a bouncer at Cowgirl BBQ, can be heard telling police dispatchers during a call he made at 1:35 a.m. Dec. 14.

Ananda went on to tell the dispatcher the women had refused his offer to call a cab for them.

"She's totally intoxicated," Ananda said. "I tried to call them a cab and they just argued with me. (They) got in their car and I said I was going to call them a cab or call the cops, and they said to call the cops, so that's what I'm doing."

Police have said the bouncer told investigators that in addition to arguing with him, the women had argued with each other over who should drive.

Throughout Ananda's three-minute talk with police about the potential drunken driver leaving the area, two women who police say are Holmes and Belvin can be heard arguing in the background.

Santa Fe police responded but did not find the 2007 Nissan Altima in which the women left. An attorney for Cowgirl BBQ has confirmed one of the women did sign a credit- or debit-card receipt for the purchase of two drinks at the bar that morning, apparently one for each woman.

Santa Fe police have said they haven't received test results on Belvin's blood alcohol content and that toxicology reports regarding Holmes' level of intoxication won't be made public until after an autopsy is concluded at the state Office of the Medical Investigator in Albuquerque.

An affidavit filed in connection with a search of the Altima showed that a bottle of vodka, suspected marijuana and unidentified pills were found in the vehicle.

About 40 minutes after Ananda's call, police received at least four calls from motorists on northbound I-25 reporting a wrong-way driver.

A dispatch log obtained from the Santa Fe County Regional Emergency Communications Center indicates the first call came at 2:16 a.m. from a woman who reported the wrong-way car nearly hit her vehicle near the Pecos/Glorieta exit, about 20 to 21 miles away from the eventual crash site near Cerrillos Road.

"Between mile marker 300 and 299, there was a car coming at us," a woman tells dispatchers.

There is a second notation of a call at 2:17.01 a.m. from Joe Mascareñas, a custodian for The New Mexican whose van was barely sideswiped by the Altima near the Pecos/Glorieta exit.

Three more callers contacted dispatchers in the next six minutes with various reports of the wrong-way driver:

• "There is a driver on the wrong side of the road on I-25 by Santa Fe (near mile marker 294)."

• "There is a wrong way driver on I-25 mile marker 288 heading south."

• "I'm driving on the 25 northbound, and there is a car driving southbound on the northbound lanes headed toward Santa Fe. I just barely missed them from a head-on. ... I am by a bridge ... by the Old Pecos Trail (exit)."

A dispatch log notation indicates the car blew by two Santa Fe County sheriff's deputies on the interstate at 2:22:57 a.m. Sheriff Robert Garcia said that occurred somewhere between the St. Francis Drive exit and the Old Pecos Trail exit.

At 2:24.20, a notation indicates, police were starting to deploy traffic spikes in an attempt to stop the Altima near the Cerrillos Road exit.

Police say the crash happened around 2:24 a.m., about a mile from where police were setting up the spikes.

By 2:31, dispatchers were already calling the Santa Fe Police Department's "fatal team" of crash investigators.

A memorial for Holmes was held Wednesday in El Paso. Attempts to reach her family or Belvin, who was released this past weekend from Christus St. Vincent Regional Medical Center, have been unsuccessful.

Carrillo, meanwhile, was able to return to her La Cienega home on Christmas Eve. After she and her family left University Hospital in Albuquerque, they received an escort from EMTs, volunteer fire departments and other first responders during Carrillo's ride home.

Her family has told The New Mexican she continues to have a lot of pain as she recovers from two broken legs, a torn arm muscle and facial fractures.

Contact Geoff Grammer at 986-3076 or ggrammer@sfnewmexican.com. Read his blog at SantaFeCrime.com.



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