Salazar recently resigned and agreed never to work as a judge again to avoid further discipline from the state Supreme Court over an incident in which the judge had pushed and spoken angrily to another city worker while at a home improvement store.
The judge had been disciplined for misconduct in the past. The clerk’s lawsuit says Salazar regularly bent the rules to serve his own purposes.
Joseph Madrid Jr. worked as a clerk under Salazar from 2015 until 2019, according to the lawsuit filed Wednesday in state District Court. During that time, the lawsuit alleges, he witnessed multiple actions by Salazar that made him uncomfortable.
Salazar did not respond to a message seeking comment Friday. Española City Manager Xavier Martinez said he hadn’t seen the lawsuit and couldn’t comment.
One instance of inappropriate behavior involved a cousin of Salazar’s by marriage, the lawsuit says.
According to the lawsuit, Madrid said he recognized the man’s name on a criminal complaint and asked the judge if he should prepare recusal paperwork because he knew the judge had recused himself from presiding over the man’s cases in the past due to the familial relationship.
But in this instance, the lawsuit says, Salazar told him not to prepare the paperwork, adding he would be the judge on the case.
When Madrid asked the judge why he wasn’t recusing himself as he had in the past, Salazar told him it was “a favor to family,” the lawsuit says.
When Madrid objected, Salazar repeated he’d handle the case and asked Madrid to do as he was told.
The lawsuit also said that over the next few years, Salazar’s wife’s cousin was a party in other cases and Salazar did not recuse himself.
Madrid’s lawsuit also claimed Salazar suspended him without pay for a day and a half after a mixup regarding his rescheduling of several trials.
Madrid believed the discipline was unwarranted, his lawsuit says, “since he was following the verbal instructions of the judge.”
In the lawsuit, Madrid says he told co-workers and his father, Rio Arriba County Magistrate Judge Joseph Madrid, he felt Salazar was not following court rules, and in April 2019, while serving his suspension from work, he told a co-worker he was considering talking to a reporter about Salazar.
Later that month, Madrid’s lawsuit says, Salazar fired him and told him his comments to others, particularly about going to the press, were the basis for his termination.
Madrid said Salazar read him the termination letter in front of a human resources director but failed to read the last line of the letter, which gave Madrid the option of resigning as opposed to being fired, the lawsuit contends.
Had he known that was an option, Madrid’s lawsuit says, he would have resigned in order to preserve a good employment record with the city.
Madrid is seeking an unspecified amount of damages, plus legal costs.
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