The case against Carlos Fierro appeared to be over a little more than a month ago when he accepted a plea deal that called for a seven-year prison sentence.

However, court documents filed Monday indicate that might not be the case.

Fierro — a local attorney who previously worked in Washington, D.C., for then Rep. Tom Udall and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. — has hired a new lawyer and claims that the sentence he agreed to in mid-November was not the sentence his lawyers told him he'd receive.

"I don't think this is the end of it," Santa Fe District Attorney Angela "Spence" Pacheco said Tuesday.

A Santa Fe County jury convicted Fierro, 37, of vehicular homicide in October, though jurors deadlocked on the second charge against him, leaving the scene of a fatal accident. Fierro's blood alcohol content on Nov. 26, 2008, after he struck William Tenorio, 46, of San Felipe Pueblo, was .21, more than double the legal driving limit.

In mid-November, Fierro pleaded no contest to leaving the scene of a fatal accident. In exchange for assurances that Fierro wouldn't appeal his conviction and would drop his motion for a new trial, Pacheco agreed to recommend suspending two years of the three-year sentence called for under the leaving-the-scene law.

The plea agreement said the year left on that charge would run consecutively with the six years called for in the vehicular homicide conviction for a total prison sentence of seven years. Fierro was given credit for 299 days of jail time and electronic monitoring and will likely serve about three years if he behaves himself while incarcerated, according to court documents.

However, Albuquerque lawyer Gene Chavez filed a motion Monday saying Fierro's lawyers told him his sentence would run concurrently, not consecutively, and that his total sentence would be seven years and not nine years, the motion says.

Jason Bowles, one of Fierro's original attorneys, said Tuesday that he thought the plea deal was clearly outlined and that he never told his client the sentence would run concurrently. Furthermore, if the sentence would have run concurrently, Fierro wouldn't have been sentenced to more than six years in prison, the maximum he could have received for the vehicular homicide conviction, Bowles said.

In addition, Chavez's motion says Fierro's lawyers told him he would receive 64 days of credit for the time he spent on electronic monitoring.

Chavez said the motion was filed to clear up "clerical errors" in the court documents. He declined to comment further.

Pacheco said she found the motion confusing because the court documents outlining Fierro's sentence indicate he was given a nine-year sentence with two years suspended for a total seven-year sentence. It also says he was given 299 days of credit for being on electronic monitoring, not 64, she pointed out. Finally, Pacheco said the deal clearly called for the sentence to run consecutively not concurrently.

"The judge went over that with him in court," Pacheco said. "And remember, he's an attorney himself. (The motion) didn't make sense to me."

Bowles said, "I knew he'd hired new counsel and I wish him the best of luck."

Court documents indicate Fierro is serving his sentence at the state prison in Los Lunas.

Contact Jason Auslander at 986-3076 or :jauslander@sfnewmexican.com.