NMSP settles lawsuit after officer pleads guilty to rape
GRANTS, N.M. (KRQE) – New Mexico State Police is paying out hundreds of thousands of dollars to a woman who was raped by a former officer when she was in high school and he was her soccer coach. A trusted figure in the community abusing his power and a young girl.
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“The effects of sexual assault on a teenager and really on anyone are lifelong,” said Lisa Curtis, attorney for the plaintiff.
According to the lawsuit, in 2018, then New Mexico State Police officer and Grants High School girl’s soccer coach, Adrian Molina, was trying to get close with one of the players and texting her regularly, which became increasingly of a more private nature.
Then, court documents state in 2019, Molina told the girl to meet him at a school parking lot, gave her homemade wine, and sexually assaulted her. Police said he later told her “she owed him” to “keep her secret.” He told her she could “pay her debt” by meeting with him. He told her to meet him again and Molina raped the teen.
According to court documents, NMSP never ran a background check on Molina when they made him a commissioned officer in 2015 and didn’t properly supervise him when he was part of the department. State Police is now paying out $400,000 to the victim.
“400,000 is a ridiculously low amount to compensate a teenager for this kind of abuse by an authority figure but that’s the cap in this state,” said Curtis. “The only way to pay for counseling for this young woman now, who has worked so hard to become something, is to make sure she has money for counseling that she will have for the rest of her life.”
Molina ended up pleading guilty to criminal sexual penetration and is now on supervised probation until July. He’s since been fired from the high school and state police.
“I mean, it is a really tough process to get justice in a sexual assault case. What we really should do is reward, thank those victims who came forward to make changes for all of us,” said Curtis.
The victim also sued the school district. That lawsuit was settled in 2022.
