Trial opens in lawsuit filed by seven Albuquerque police officers against city

Testimony began Monday in a lawsuit that stems from a 2023 policy at the Albuquerque police academy that required male cadets to razor-shave their heads each morning.

An attorney for the city told jurors that the case centers on the harassment of a cadet by staff at the academy that ended in disciplinary actions against seven Albuquerque Police Department officers.

An attorney for the officers who filed the lawsuit last year argued that APD leaders, including Chief Harold Medina, retaliated against the academy staff members who terminated a cadet in August 2023 whose father is a top APD commander.

“This case begins with a lie told by a police cadet named Josh Vega,” said Levi Monagle, who represents the seven officers. Vega lied when he told academy staff that he had razor-shaved his head that morning, Monagle said in opening statements. APD staff agreed to terminate Vega from the academy for the “class-one violation” of lying, he said.

“This story begins with a lie and it ends with the erasure of that lie by some of the highest ranking members of the Albuquerque Police Department,” Monagle told jurors. “Josh Vega suffered no formal sanctions from the department for his admitted dishonesty. The academy staff, who reported that dishonesty, were disciplined instead.”

Jessica Serrano, who represents the city of Albuquerque, said in opening statements that the academy staff was disciplined for hazing the cadet by forcing him to shave his head with a manual razor in front of fellow cadets while academy staff yelled at him.

“The rest of the class was forced to perform physical training exercises in what is called a smoke session, and they were not going to be allowed to stop until Joshua Vega finished shaving his head,” Serrano told jurors.

The lawsuit, filed in April 2024 in 2nd Judicial District Court, alleges that then-APD Cmdr. George Vega used his influence to get his son reinstated to the police academy in August 2023.

The whistleblower lawsuit also alleges that city officials retaliated against the seven academy training officers for sending an Aug. 24, 2023, letter to Medina informing him of the incident. The suit alleges that Joshua Vega was quickly reinstated, after violating the policy and allegedly lying about it. It also alleges that seven staff members at the academy were illegally removed from their posts and later investigated for hazing for reporting the policy violation.

All seven officers named as plaintiffs in the suit continue to serve as APD officers, city spokesman Gilbert Gallegos said Monday.

Serrano told jurors that Joshua Vega had shaved his head that morning with an electric razor. Following an internal affairs investigation, Vega was found to have violated a class-five violation far less serious than lying, she said.

“The evidence will also show you that Chief Medina does not condone hazing and has a history of not condoning hazing,” Serrano said. The seven academy staff were temporarily assigned to other departments while an independent attorney investigated, she said. The officers later received “verbal reprimands.”

“After the conclusion of the investigation, and after they received these verbal reprimands, all of the plaintiffs could have returned to the academy,” Serrano said. “However, not all of them did, for reasons of their own.”

The series of events began Aug. 1, 2023, when a new class of 128 cadets entered the academy, including Joshua Vega, the son of George Vega, who now is APD’s deputy chief.

Around the same time, Academy Cmdr. Joseph Viers reinstituted an “old school” policy that required cadets to razor-shave their heads every morning. On Aug. 16, 2023, a training officer noticed that Joshua Vega had not razor-shaved his head that morning.

When confronted, the cadet at first maintained that he had shaved his head, but later admitted that he had not, which was considered a “class one” violation of lying, Monagle contends.

Viers terminated Vega from the academy on Aug. 17, 2023, after an APD Internal Affairs investigation found that Vega had lied to the staff, the suit alleges. That evening, the suit alleges, George Vega had a phone conversation with Viers.

On Aug. 18, 2023, following a meeting between Viers and other APD leaders, Viers reversed his decision and reinstated Joshua Vega to the academy, the lawsuit states.

Also that day, the seven academy training officers were called to APD headquarters and informed that they were being removed from the posts at the academy and assigned to other duties, it states.

On Sept. 25, 2023, the seven officers received a letter from Medina notifying them that they were the targets of an investigation into “alleged inappropriate conduct, to possibly include hazing, toward a cadet,” the suit alleges.

Three of the officers who filed the lawsuit — Lisa Neil, Shane Treadaway and Steve Martinez — returned to work at the APD academy in January 2024.

The other plaintiffs in the suit are Tillery Stahr, Alix Emrich, James Jacoby and Kelsey Lueckenhoff.