Bear spray suspect sentenced in plea deal

A Tucumcari man accused of spraying bear spray on two people and punching a city police officer in November 2021 was given credit for time served in jail with a recent plea deal.

Frank Christopher Link, now 54, initially was charged with aggravated battery upon a police officer (no great bodily harm), disarming a police officer (removing firearm or weapon) and two counts of aggravated battery (great bodily harm) — all felonies.

According to online court documents, Link pleaded guilty to battery upon a police officer, and the other counts were dismissed as part of the plea deal.

District Judge Albert Mitchell Jr. sentenced Link to 18 months in prison with credit for time served. According to court documents, Link received credit for pre-sentence confinement from Nov. 16, 2021, to May 23, 2023, for a total credit of one year, six months and eight days.

Links also was ordered to pay a $5 domestic violence offender treatment fee, a $75 crime victims reparation fee, plus a $100 fee to the Probation and Parole Division of the New Mexico Corrections Department and provide a DNA sample for the department’s database. Any jail time Link served over and above his sentence would satisfy the requirements for fees.

After his sentencing on May 23, Link was released from custody.

According to the initial criminal complaint filed by and a pretrial motion from the district attorney’s office, officers were dispatched the evening of Nov. 16 to the 800 block of West Hancock Avenue to check on a bear-spray report.

A driver told an officer he and a woman were stopped at First Street and Tucumcari Boulevard when a man drove by in a moped and sprayed bear spray on the side of his truck.

The driver followed the man to the 800 block of West Hancock Avenue. There, the man sprayed the driver, ran around the back of an apartment building and got back on his moped.

As the man ran, he opened the passenger door of the truck and sprayed toward the woman inside. The woman was hospitalized due to the attack, but her condition was not known, according to the motion.

Tucumcari Police Cpl. Herman Martinez found Link near the entrance of a West Tucumcari Boulevard motel and asked him whether he could see one of the sprays hanging from his pockets.

“He began to reach into his pocket, grabbed a can of spray and handed it to Cpl. Martinez and suddenly threw a punch at Cpl. Martinez, striking him on the left side of the face,” the complaint stated.

According to the prosecutor’s motion, Martinez pulled out a Taser but didn’t use it because he thought it would be ineffective against Link’s layers of clothing.

Link grabbed the Taser out of Martinez’s hand, pointed it at the officer and pulled the trigger. The Taser did not activate because it was not turned on.

Martinez tackled Link and knocked the Taser out of Link’s hand. Link began reaching for Martinez’s firearm but was able only to grab the officer’s extra magazines.

Martinez and a passerby subdued Link, and the suspect was placed in hand restraints.

Several bear-spray incidents were reported in Tucumcari during that time, sending several residents to a hospital for treatment. A prosecutor argued in a pretrial detention motion after Link’s arrest that he was responsible for the other attacks.

Tucumcari police, during the same month Link was arrested, issued a bulletin, asking for residents to be on the lookout for a man in a long black coat “spraying unsuspecting individuals and vehicles with what is believed to be bear spray.”

Bear spray is made of pepper oil that can irritate the eyes, throat and lungs. It can cause permanent eye damage in some instances.

A few weeks after Link’s arrest, he was ruled incompetent for trial. After more than a year in treatment, he was ruled competent in late March.

Public defender Anna Aragon of Las Vegas was Link’s attorney. An email to her requesting comment was not returned.