Parents of a former Española Valley athlete are suing the district and administration alleging physical abuse and retaliation by boys basketball coach Joey Trujillo and assistant Filiberto Dominguez.
Luke Archuleta was removed from the basketball team before the season, and he later transferred to Los Alamos.
His parents, Ruben and Tina Archuleta, filed a lawsuit on his behalf. The Archuleta family filed the case on June 26, and it was assigned to Judge Jason Lidyard.
The main allegation comes from a June 3, 2022 basketball camp in Santa Fe. The Archuleta family claims that at one point, after Luke asked a teammate a question, Dominguez turned to Luke and yelled, “Shut the f… up!” loud enough for his parents to hear in the stands.
Later, Dominguez allegedly “forcefully poked Luke in the head to the point his head snapped back.” According to the complaint, a teammate then said to Luke, “Damn, bro! [Dominguez] just little bro’d you.” Archuleta feared that Dominguez would further physically harm him.
The lawsuit claims that Archuleta’s playing time was limited after that incident. Later, Ruben Archuleta approached Dominguez, who “went on to complain about Luke and his bad behavior.”
According to the lawsuit, Dominguez was introduced to the team on May 27, 2022, and would “be in charge” until Trujillo officially started “later in the year”. Trujillo’s hiring was first announced by Board Member Jeremy Maestas on Facebook on April 28. The complaint claims that Dominguez was not properly licensed at the time.
Later in June 2022, at a practice after Trujillo took over as coach, the lawsuit claims that Trujillo failed to control a verbal argument where “the other kid told Luke he sucked several times,” then Archuleta pushed another player. In response, Trujillo told Archuleta to leave practice.
Tina Archuleta approached Trujillo and athletic director Matthew Abeyta, according to the lawsuit, in a meeting in which Trujillo called Luke a liar. After another meeting in July with Tina Archuleta, Abeyta, and the school superintendent, security director and principal, after which Dominguez was away from the team briefly during an investigation, but he returned to practice two days later.
Archuleta was cut from the basketball team in November after routine tryouts, the lawsuit claims, despite having played on the varsity team in 2021-22.
According to the complaint, the New Mexico Activities Association ruled a hardship for Archuleta, allowing him to play for Los Alamos after transferring, “because of the medical conditions inflicted upon him by Defendants.”
Ironically, Ruben Archuleta also serves on the School Board that he is suing. He is also a member of the Northern New Mexico College Board of Regents
Luke Archuleta was on the varsity basketball team as a sophomore and played sparingly off the bench. For his junior year in football, in Fall 2022, Archuleta was second on the team with 35 tackles. He is currently listed on the Los Alamos football roster for the fall as a middle linebacker.
Archuleta also brought Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham to the Homecoming game in 2022, and she escorted him at halftime when he was on Homecoming Court.
Neither Archuleta nor school superintendent Holly Martinez have yet returned calls requesting comment. This story will be updated if they respond.
Restraining Order with Teammate
In September 2020, Tina Archuleta filed for a restraining order against another mother of an Española basketball and football player, on behalf of the Archuleta family and against the entire other family, which resulted in a “stay away” order. That order acknowledged that the families would likely be together at school events, and that they “shall not conduct themselves in any manner that is intended to interfere with the other party’s participation in and enjoyment of such events, or in manner that is likely to interfere with the other party’s participation in and enjoyment of such events.”
The other parent reopened the case in January 2023.
One of her allegations was that coaches including Dominguez and Trujillo told her that Ruben Archuleta would “contact (the coaches) in person, and by telephone to tell them we were crazy, and would make their lives hell.”
She also claimed that in January, Ruben Archuleta approached her son and made physical and verbal contact, and claimed she had evidence from an Inspection of Public Records Act request that provided video and photos.
The Archuleta family did not deny these occurrences, but claimed that they did not violate the stay away order, and in a later response claimed that “any contact that may have occurred was civil, minimal, and brief under the circumstances.” They asked to terminate the order as Luke no longer attends Española Valley.
The court ultimately denied that the agreement had been violated, and granted in part the Archuletas’ motion to dismiss. The court ordered the expiration of the agreement on March 7, 2024. And as part of the agreement, Ruben Archuleta was ordered not to hand the other student his diploma at Española’s 2023 graduation.