Sensitive readers are cautioned that this article contains reports of sexual violence. If you or someone you know experiences sexual violence, you can find local support via La Piñon’s 24-Hour Crisis Hotline at 575-526-3437 or go to www.lapinon.org.

New Mexico State University Board of Regents reached a $1 million settlement in a lawsuit resulting from a 2022 sexual assault on campus.

The lawsuit, which named the university’s Board of Regents and Aizen Robert Saucedo as defendants, claimed that a female student was sexually assaulted in her dorm room in Juniper Hall by Saucedo, also an NMSU student living in another on-campus dorm, and that the university not only failed to prevent the assault but failed to protect the victim after she reported it.

Elicia Montoya, an attorney with Albuquerque-based McGinn, Montoya, Love, Curry and Sievers representing the woman, said her client hoped the settlement would foster change at NMSU.

“It’s never been about the money, but we’re hoping that this amount of money sends a message to New Mexico State University, and to all universities, that they need to be held accountable and they need to take reports of sexual assault seriously,” Montoya said in an interview with the Las Cruces Sun-News.

The settlement funds are paid and administered by New Mexico’s Risk Management Division, and will be placed in a trust account. Amanda Bradford, director of communications and media relations at NMSU, said there was no way yet to know what sort of impact the settlement would have on premiums paid by the university.

The settlement, signed in July 2025, dismisses the woman’s lawsuit against the university. Court records show the suit was scheduled for a jury trial in February 2026 before a Bernalillo County district judge. The woman was a resident of Bernalillo County at the time the lawsuit was filed.

Montoya said the settlement allowed her client to force NMSU to begin providing mandatory consent and sexual assault training for the first time in the university’s history, while a trial would not have guaranteed such an outcome.

“Our client, as the fearless advocate she is, would have gone to trial. For her, I think that the opportunity to have this mandatory training begin this fall, so before this school year started, … that was the most important thing,” Montoya said.

“New Mexico State University takes allegations of this kind very seriously. The safety and well-being of all our students is our highest priority. We share the plaintiff’s stated commitment to reducing the number of sexual assaults committed on campus in the future, and have expanded mandatory consent and sexual assault training for all students beginning this fall. This mandatory training is the latest in NMSU’s ongoing efforts to heighten awareness, enhance safety, and support students,” Bradford wrote in a statement to the Las Cruces Sun-News.

In July 2024 a jury found Saucedo not guilty of three counts of criminal sexual penetration in the third degree.

Lawsuit claimed NMSU failed to protect student, properly train staff

McGinn, Montoya, Love, Curry and Sievers, P.A. filed the lawsuit on behalf of the anonymous victim who is referred to in the lawsuit as Sexual Assault Survivor (S.A. Survivor), and her parent, whom it said had financed the woman’s college education. The Sun-News does not name victims of sexual assault.

The lawsuit claimed NMSU was responsible for the safety of all the students that resided on campus and failed to meet that responsibility by prolonging the rape investigation and allowing Saucedo to attend classes despite an order of protection and failing to discipline him. Saucedo was ultimately dismissed from NMSU for three years in August 2023, according to the lawsuit.

The suit also claims the university did not have adequate security measures or policies in place to protect students at risk of sexual assault in its housing facilities or properly train its staff to respond to reports of sexual assault.

“First of all, the second that she (the victim) reported what happened to the police and even after the New Mexico State University police reported that to (New) Mexico State University, they (the university) failed to take her seriously at every juncture. They didn’t investigate it. They, I mean, they sat on their hands and they ignored it, frankly, for over an entire school year,” Montoya said.

The lawsuit claimed there were dozens of reports of rape on campus with “at least 12 of the reports occurring on campus student housing at either Juniper Hall, Pinon Hall, Rhodes-Garrett-Hamiel Hall and Garcia Hall.”

Bradford said of NMSU, “We continually test, evaluate, and update our existing safety and security procedures to better serve our students and provide the safest possible residential environment for the NMSU community.”

As part of the settlement, the university said it would “implement” training on mandatory consent and sexual assault for all students beginning in the fall 2025. Bradford said that NMSU had provided sexual assault prevention and awareness programming for its students.

She said the mandatory consent and sexual assault prevention course is administered to all students alongside the Title IX/Office of Institutional Equity. Students complete the course online, which allows NMSU to track who participates and enforce participation with a registration hold until it is completed.

The settlement also releases the university from claims in the lawsuit relating to Inspection of Public Records Act requests made through December 2024.

“New Mexico State University in this situation had all the power. When you have students going to college for the very first time, leaving home for the very first time, ready to set the world on fire, relying on the university to help guide them — to give them education both in the classroom and beyond — New Mexico State University promises to provide those things, and it completely failed. So, we’re hoping with this settlement that it really does create systemic change, and it really does take reports seriously, and it really does act to prevent sexual assault on campus and to make their students safer,” Montoya said.

Student alleged sexual assault in door room at NMSU in 2022

In September 2022, the freshman named anonymously in the lawsuit reported being raped in Juniper Hall to campus police.

According to court documents, the woman attended a football game with a group of friends that included Saucedo followed by an off-campus party. The woman reported to campus police that both she and Saucedo had been drinking, according to the probable cause complaint against Saucedo. The lawsuit alleged that Saucedo followed her into Juniper Hall then to her room and over a two-hour period raped her before leaving the dormitory. Saucedo went unchallenged by security while entering and leaving the dormitory, according to the lawsuit.

New Mexico State requires all freshmen to reside on-campus in campus housing.

Saucedo was charged with three counts of criminal sexual penetration in the third degree in October 2022. He was allowed to remain on campus and in campus dormitory. A jury ultimately found him not guilty of the criminal charges in the case.

“We hope that if somebody does get assaulted on campus, they (NMSU) respond, they take it seriously, they investigate immediately, promptly and thoroughly. And so, we hope that this settlement brings systemic change to (New) Mexico State University and all of the universities here in New Mexico to make all of our students safer,” Montoya said.

Bradford said the university spent the last six months reviewing its policies and procedures, and is “currently in the process of revising and clarifying policy drafts.”

Jessica Onsurez can be reached at [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter at @jussGREAT.