AZTEC, N.M. (KRQE) – Seven years after the shooting at Aztec High School, the school district has settled with the mother of one of the victims. She sued the district for wrongful death and for what she discovered after her daughter died: that a teacher was having an inappropriate relationship with her daughter.
It was a terrifying scene on December 7, 2017, when a school shooter killed two students at Aztec High School. Casey Marquez was one of the victims.
“In fact, there was two monsters on the day of the shooting…the shooter as well as JD Coulter who was the teacher at the time,” said Sam DeFillippo, an attorney representing the victim’s mother.
He said it was after Marquez’s death, when her cell phone was returned, that they found inappropriate text messages from her teacher, James Coulter.
“We actually determined that Ms. Marquez was actually leaving Mr. Coulter’s office, somewhere she was not supposed to be, just prior to the shooting occurring,” he said.
In 2019, Marquez’s mother sued the school district for wrongful death for the shooting death of her daughter and for the sexual harassment to her daughter. According to the lawsuit, Coulter admitted to groping her and kissing her.
It also states he admitted to inappropriate relationships with other minors as early as 2015. “The school did not take the actions necessary to protect their students, instead they protected their teachers, which is something we would never want to see,” said DeFillippo.
Now, years later the district has settled for nearly $2 million. DeFillippo said the district will pay $750,000 for the wrongful death, noting there is a limit in New Mexico for how much can be recovered from governmental entities. He said the district will pay $1,200,000 for the personal injury part of the lawsuit.
DeFillippo said for his client, it is about change in the system, not the money. “It was an extremely devastating case for our client. However, she wanted to make sure this case went through its totality to make sure that these changes would occur within the school district moving forward,” said DeFillippo. Attorneys for the Aztec Municipal School District had no comment.
In 2019, Coulter pled guilty to criminal sexual contact of a minor for an inappropriate relationship he had with another victim. He was released from prison in 2020. He had to register as a sex offender. The Public Education Department also revoked his license to be an educator.
