SILVER CITY, N.M. (KRQE) – For the last year, Western New Mexico University’s former president, Joseph Shepard, has been at the center of controversy and allegations surrounding university spending.
The former university president is denying all claims of fraud and, in a recent lawsuit, is instead claiming to be the target of retaliation and conspiracy. Shepard had been the President of Western New Mexico University since July of 2011, but in January, he resigned, amid allegations of improper spending at the school.
“To go through this experience has been absolutely horrendous. It uprooted my life, my career, it destroyed my career,” Joseph Shepard told News 13.
Shepard and the university again faced scrutiny after it was revealed he would be given a $1.9 million severance package and stay on as a professor.
In July, the university’s Board of Regents took back the money from Shepard, and he was fired from his teaching position. The former president of the university said this was an act of retaliation, citing a recent special audit, which he says exonerates him. “And that audit said there was no corruption, there was no fraud, there was no abuse, there was no material waste, that the university has handled itself ethically, competently,” said Shepard.
Now, Shepard is filing a lawsuit against the university and others he believes are guilty of fraud. “And what led up to this, really, in my mind was I spoke truth to power. I noticed that there’s what I considered to be fraudulent activity on behalf of a local senator and her colleague,” said Shepard.
The lawsuit names the university, several current and former lawmakers, and the current state auditor.
Shepard said in the lawsuit he was retaliated against for blowing the whistle on the fraudulent appropriation of $1 million, claiming one lawmaker put the funds towards her child’s charter school on campus, and says it was not done above board.
“First and foremost, what I want out of this is I never want this to happen to anybody else,” said Shepard.
