Two battery charges, later discharged, and almost $200K in liens plague school board candidate's campaign

A local parents group has raised concerns with Albuquerque Public Schools board District 1 candidate Robert Trujillo, who according to court records pleaded guilty to two 2006 battery charges and, according to tax records, has almost $200,000 in outstanding federal tax liens against his business.

Trujillo has acknowledged both, saying he feels he’s paid his debt to society on the battery charges, which eventually were conditionally discharged, and that although he wasn’t aware of the liens until recently, he’s now working to rectify the situation.

“Am I proud of anything that I’ve done? No, I definitely am not,” he told the Journal. “This is not my character. It was a mistake that was made. We’ve moved on from that … and I would hope that people would see me for the person that I am and for all the good that I have brought to this district.”

According to the incident report, which was provided to the Journal by New Mexico Moms Against Violence in Schools, Trujillo in 2006 was in his South Valley home when he barged in after his then-best friend patted the leg of his former wife and accused the two of sexual intercourse.

After Trujillo forced his friend out the door, Trujillo’s former wife said he threw her to the floor and hit her in the face. She told police he then retrieved a black handgun from a drawer and went outside to threaten the friend.

Trujillo, the friend said, then confronted him, loading the pistol as he approached. The friend told police Trujillo grabbed him by the throat, choked him, hit him in the chest and head with the gun and held it against him, at one point allegedly beginning to squeeze the trigger.

After several minutes, Trujillo let the friend go and told him to leave, which he did. Trujillo briefly locked his former wife out of the house, she said, but after a few minutes came out and argued with her on the lawn, where he allegedly also grabbed her by the crotch and lifted her up.

According to the report, the two eventually went inside and argued for much of the rest of the night. At one point, Trujillo’s former wife told police that he told her she was lucky his 8-year-old son was home at the time.

Trujillo originally faced several charges, including a kidnapping charge. He pleaded down to two — aggravated battery and battery against a household member — and was sentenced to three years of supervised probation.

But Trujillo, to be clear, is not technically a convicted felon, according to the 2nd Judicial District Attorney’s Office, because his charges were conditionally discharged and his case was dismissed.

He also disputed the narrative laid out in the incident report, saying he did not choke or point a gun at his friend, nor did he abuse his wife. Instead, he said the battery charges came from him forcefully throwing his former wife and friend out of the house and later fighting with the friend outside.

Michelle Mayorga, a member of New Mexico Moms Against Violence in Schools, said that even with the conditional discharges, she is still concerned about having someone with a past like that representing children, especially if his own son was in the house at the time.

“It doesn’t make me feel like my child who is an APS student will be safe with Robert Trujillo at the helm,” she said.

Everytown for Gun Safety, which advocates against gun violence, rescinded Trujillo’s Gun Sense Candidate distinction, which signals a candidate, if elected, “will govern with gun safety in mind.”

Liens

According to two Internal Revenue Service documents provided to the Journal, Trujillo’s company, Robert Trujillo Construction LLC, has almost $200,000 in federal tax liens stemming from unpaid balances that date back to the tax period ending in 2013.

Trujillo said he learned of the liens through research for a Journal questionnaire, and that he hadn’t received the notices from the IRS about them. He added the liens came from a former accountant who had failed to pay payroll taxes “even though we sent payment to him for these taxes.”

The Journal could not definitively determine if a former accountant failing to pay taxes was the reason for all the unpaid balances.

Regardless, Trujillo said he’s in the process of paying the liens off, though they are still completely outstanding.

“I’m taking care of it. I plan to pay everything back that is owed,” he said.

Mayorga said she is also concerned with the liens situation, questioning his ability to make financial decisions for APS.

“He wants the ability to spend our tax dollars when his business is almost $200,000 indebted to the federal government for not paying taxes,” she said. “Why should I put somebody who’s not going to pay taxes in charge of spending my tax dollars?”