New Mexico

Missing Pieces: A largely ignored blueprint? | 4 Investigates

Published

1 year ago

December 13, 2024

Missing Pieces: A largely ignored blueprint? | 4 Investigates

What should we do with our state’s youngest criminals? It’s a question many leaders in New Mexico have different answers for.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — What should we do with our state’s youngest criminals? It’s a question many leaders in New Mexico have different answers for.

Harsher consequences? Perhaps, more time spent behind bars?

One expert argues the state is missing the most important piece of the puzzle.

There are crimes that shock us to our core – many of them involving criminals who are just children – but we can only see parts of a much bigger picture related to troubled teens.

“We think of them as master criminals, monstrous individuals, but they’re not,” Dr. George Davis said. “The truth is they’re impulsive they’re dysregulated.”

Dr. George Davis spent decades working as a child psychiatrist. He spent many of those years working for the Juvenile Justice Division of the New Mexico Children Youth & Families Department.

Davis has boxes of information few other people have access to. That information went into a study published in 2016. While the research published in 2016 was based on 220 kids incarcerated in 2011, Davis expanded his study to include youth incarcerated from 2011 to 2018.

Davis said the unpublished study, comprised of more than 1,500 youth, mirrored his findings in 2016.

“I think the most shocking thing is how immense the load of trauma was in these delinquent kids,” he said. “It was stunning.”

Davis looked at ACEs – Adverse Childhood Experiences – and found almost every child in juvenile jail had a history of neglect. In fact, close to 8 in 10 children grew up in a household with substance abuse and more than 9 in 10 had a diagnosed substance use disorder.

Davis also discovered more than half of those children had prior contact with CYFD’s Protective Services Division. Of the female juveniles incarcerated, the research found some of them had an average of eight to nine referrals.

“I don’t know that we’ve talked specifically about the study because what’s in the study is what we all know,” said Kathey Phoenix-Doyle, the deputy CYFD secretary who works with the Family Services Division, focused on preventing abuse.

KOB 4 asked about research showing a history of physical and emotional neglect being present in 90% of juvenile delinquent offenders who are locked up.

“One of the areas we’re developing right now is our multi-level response, which is often called ‘Alternative Response.’ The reason I bring that up is, when you’re talking about neglect, what we’re doing is building a system where neglect cases may come in. Rather than an investigation, it shifts to a full family assessment,” Phoenix-Doyle said.

Phoenix-Doyle added that CYFD is making progress.

That’s despite new data showing the number of incarcerated kids, who are also involved in protective services, has doubled in the last four years.

Graph by New Mexico’s Children Youth & Families Department (CYFD)

“We’re looking to address, not only the delinquent behavior that happened but also what led to that behavior,” said Corey Adams, the deputy director of CYFD’s juvenile justice field services.

Adams said probation officers are working harder than ever to connect with kids in a more meaningful way.

“If that youth does not have any resources or doesn’t have somebody in their corner, that’s a huge red flag for us. Obviously, early substance abuse is. Truancy. If we’re seeing truancy, they are very likely to end up back in the office for a delinquent offense without some sort of intervention,” Adams said.

Dr. Davis agrees. He believes there is only one way to complete the juvenile justice picture in our state.

“People will say, ‘Well, if they’re damaged by early childhood abuse, then they’re still a public menace,’ and the fact is, a lot of that can be addressed,” Dr. Davis said. “I mean, the earlier you address it, the better. That’s why the reform that’s supposed to be going on at CYFD is so significant.”

It has been nine years since his study was published.

While CYFD said the report contains “what we all know,” child abuse prevention is still just 10% of the department’s overall budget. And our state’s repeat maltreatment rate is still among the highest in the nation.

“Missing Pieces” is a 4 Investigates series examining the evidence of a juvenile justice system once again under scrutiny. 4 Investigates is examining the problems in the system, the role that New Mexico’s Children Youth and Families Department is playing and meaningful solutions that have proven to work. Our goal is to be armed with knowledge as our lawmakers head to the Roundhouse in January.

Source link

Click to comment

New Mexico

Timothy Busfield Charged With Child Sex Abuse On ‘The Cleaning Lady’s New Mexico Set; WBTV Will “Cooperate With Law Enforcement”

Published

11 hours ago

January 10, 2026

Press Room

Timothy Busfield Charged With Child Sex Abuse On ‘The Cleaning Lady’s New Mexico Set; WBTV Will “Cooperate With Law Enforcement”

A 10-year-old New Mexico boy says Timothy Busfield “touched his ‘poop’ and ‘pee’ area” during production on The Cleaning Lady, an Albuquerque District Attorney–approved arrest warrant issued today says.

“In my training and experience, pedophiles often infiltrate families under a trusted role, like Timothy, who, as a producer, exploited the hectic film sets to tickle and touch SL on his penis and buttocks, masking it as play,” the warrant from Albuquerque Police Officer Marvin Brown asserts. “He would invite the family to off-set gatherings, with his wife buying Christmas gifts to foster closeness, making SL feel special and dependent—classic grooming to erode boundaries, isolate the victim, and silence suspicions by blending abuse into normalcy.”

<br />

Filled with accounts from two brothers of their alleged repeated experiences with the Thirtysomething alum, who was a director on the now shuttered Élodie Yung-led Fox drama from Warner Bros TV, the document charges Busfield with two counts of criminal sexual contact with a minor and child abuse. It is unclear at this point if the Emmy winner has been arrested and booked by Albuquerque Police Department.

If found guilty of the charges, Busfield could face a minimum of three years behind bars.

In fact, the 68-year-old, who was accused but never charged in two previous sexual assault allegations in 1994 and 2012, could be looking at a lot longer sentence in the Land of Enchantment.

Under New Mexico statutes, prison time in sex crimes against minors leans heavily on context and circumstances in the degrees of punishment they hand out. That time and felony class can go up substantially if the crime involves children under 13 years of age — as it allegedly does here.

Named as “SL” and “VL” in the warrant, the two 2014-born boys appeared on The Cleaning Lady over multiple seasons before being let go for having aged out of the role, I hear. However, in a Nov. 3, 2025 phone interview with Busfield in the warrant, The West Wing vet told investigating Officer Brown that he “the lead actress, Elodie Young” informed him over a year ago that “the mother of SL and VL (sic) that she wanted revenge, and I’m going to get my revenge on Tim Busfield for not bringing her kids back for the final season.”

Courtesy of Fox

In interviews conducted with SL and VL on Halloween last year by a “forensic child interviewer,” and observed by Officer Brown, today’s arrest warrant says that the former told them the alleged abuse by Busfield started when he was 7 years old and on The Cleaning Lady.

“SL said that Tim touched him three to four times on his ‘poop’ and ‘pee’ area over his clothing,” the 12-page arrest warrant states of what is cited as a second incident with Busfield, very similar to a previous incident. “SL said he was very afraid of Tim and was relieved when he was off set. SL said he was afraid to tell anyone because Tim was the director, and he feared Tim would get mad at him. SL did advise that Tim touched him while he was only on set filming in Albuquerque.”

SL now suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety, the warrant says. SL disclosing having nightmares about the director touching him and waking up scared,” the document adds.

It goes on: “VL explained that Mr. Tim started touching them for the first two years, and he did not want to say anything, because he did not want to be mean to him. Therefore, VL did not say anything. VL said Mr. Tim would start touching him with his hands about his body while they were filming in the ‘house’. VL advised that it was about his body, but did not disclose that he was touched on his buttocks or penis area. VL said he did not like being touched, but did not say anything because he did not want to get in trouble.”

The matter actually first came to the cops’ attention in late 2024 when a doctor from University of New Mexico Hospital contacted the Albuquerque Police Department in regards to a “sexual abuse investigation.”

Noting that the boys’ father had been advised to go to the hospital by a local law firm, today’s warrant details: Officer Osborn talked with both VL and SL, who did not disclose any sexual contact at this time. However, both boys advised that Timothy Busfield, whom they referred to as ‘Uncle Tim’, would tickle them on the stomach and legs. Neither boy cared for the tickling. Officer Osborn contacted Detective Michael Brown with the Crimes Against Children Unit and determined that the case did not meet their acceptance criteria at this time.”

The matter came back to the police’s attention and became a much greater priority after the boys’ mother “advised that on 09/02/2025, SL reported to his counselor that Timothy Busfield touched his penis and bottom.”

In that same telephone conversation with Busfield in the weeks before Thanksgiving last year, the NYC-based filmmaker also dropped to Officer Brown that producers Warner Bros TV had conducted its own probe into allegations against him after SAG-AFTRA received an anonymous complaint in early 2025 of an incident on The Cleaning Lady set in December 2024. After writing up a search warrant for WB (which today’s warrant seems to mistakenly say occurred on “10/03/2025”) and several correspondences with WB attorney Richard Wessling at law firm Proskauer, Officer Brown on NYE last year got his hands on the March 31, 2025 external report put together by the LA office of Solomon Law.

Specifically the report, which saw Busfield suspended during the probe, looked into claims from the hotline caller that there was evidence of Busfield “tickling and caressing the head and body of minor boys” while working on the Albuquerque-filmed Cleaning Lady. Upon his own reading of the document, Officer Brown says in Friday’s warrant that Solomon investigator “Christina McGovern was not able to talk with anyone who would support evidence that Timothy Busfield engaged in this behavior.”

Working from what now seems to be limited accusations, the WBTV investigation viewed Busfield as “exonerated,” sources tell me.

In a statement to Deadline tonight, the Channing Dungey-led WBTV said: “The health and safety of our cast and crew is always our top priority, especially the safety of minors on our productions. We take all allegations of misconduct very seriously and have systems in place to promptly and thoroughly investigate, and when needed, take appropriate action. We are aware of the current charges against Mr. Busfield and have been and will continue to cooperate with law enforcement.”

As well as speaking to the boys’ mother and father (who seem to have instigated and then ceased a civil suit on this), plus some Cleaning Lady production assistants and Make-up and Hair department staffers, today’s warrant also details a brief back-and-forth between Officer Brown and the series star Yung, who was a producer too.

“On 11/5/2025, I contacted Elodie Yung to set up an interview. Elodie agreed to meet with me at the Northwest Substation on 11/7/2025,” Officer Brown notes in his fairly comprehensive affidavit that e Albuquerque Assistant DA Savannah Brandenburg-Koch signed off on today. “I did initially advise Elodie that Tim Busfield gave me her name and said that she may have information about this case. On 11/06/2025, Elodie left me a voicemail declining to speak with me and said that she does not want to be involved with the investigation and that she would not have any information that could assist in this case.”

Busfield’s agents at Innovative Artists did not respond late Friday to Deadline’s request for comment on the arrest warrant and the charges against their client.

Source link

New Mexico

New Mexico Public Education Department faces $35 million shortfall

Published

23 hours ago

January 9, 2026

Press Room

New Mexico Public Education Department faces million shortfall

The New Mexico Public Education Department is facing a $35 million deficit, which it attributes to overpayments made to Gallup-McKinley County Schools, a claim the district disputes, arguing they are being wrongly blamed for the state’s funding mismanagement.

Source link