By Frost McGahey
Investigative Journalist
The Gila 100 book with photographs by Jay hemphill
On Friday, June 27, the State Ethics Commission filed a civil lawsuit alleging former WNMU President Joseph Shepard used public funds to build a patio on campus for his daughter’s wedding.
A spokesperson for the State Ethics Commission told the Silver City Daily Press on Monday that this most recent lawsuit stems from an anonymous complaint the agency received from its whistleblower portal.*
Back in November 2024 Dr. Shepard was the object of a campaign against him, but that investigation stalled.**
The new complaint contains a statement from Jay Hemphill, a former photographer for the university. He claimed that during a dinner in Santa Fe during the 2023 legislative session, he overheard a WNMU employee tell Shepard that she would submit a purchase order for the flowers for Shepard’s daughter’s wedding.
Hemphill said Shepard told the employee to say the flowers were for graduation, not the wedding, and that “no one will know the difference.”
The Beat has learned that one of the regents who was at the Graduation Ceremony admired the flowered centerpiece. Shepard’s wife asked her if she wanted to take home the arrangement. “Don’t you want to save it for the wedding?” the regent asked. “No, that’s too far away. The flowers won’t last,” Shepard’s wife replied. That was on May 5. The daughter’s wedding was on May 13, eight days later which was too far away for flowers to last.
Jay Hemphill had benefited from Dr. Shepard’s time at Western. In 2013 Jay became the university photographer at a starting salary of $45,000. By 2024, Jay was earning $57,676 which helped his family as his wife, Siah Hemphill, had become a State Senator in 2021, an unpaid position that had made her quit her job as a school psychologist.
In her first term, Siah Hemphill was appointed to the influential State Senate Finance Committee “marking an unusually swift placement of a freshman senator to such a high-profile committee.”*** This committee allocates money, among other things, to the state’s universities.
In 2023, Jay Hemphill was approved for a paid sabbatical from May to July to work on his book: The Gila 100: Photographs Celebrating the First Wilderness Centennial. It was published by the Mimbres Press, a division of Western New Mexico University, in May 2024 with a 100 of Jay’s photographs. It had a print run of 1000, according to WNMU, it has sold 291 copies. (Available on Amazon.)
The book launch, an important event for the author, was supposed to be on May 1,2024, but Jay didn’t attend it. That decision could be due to the Concerned Citizens of Grant County filing a few days earlier on April 26 an Inspection of Public Records Act (IPRA). They requested all records regarding expenditures of public funds for “Senator Hemphill’s vanity photography book of her husband.”
A source said that Siah Hemphill was alerted to the IPRA request and that’s why Jay said he couldn’t attend his own book launch. Senator Hemphill, also on May 1, did her own IPRA request for documents “regarding James Hemphill and a copy of all information that was or will be sent in reply.”
To be continued….
*Shepard pushes back on new patio suit - Silvercity Daily Press (scdailypress.com)
**Has the Political Witchhunt against Dr. Shepard Stalled? (grantcountybeat.com)
***ChatGPT
