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Eyman must wait until December to get his day in court

Published 2:42 pm Monday, November 23, 2020

Initiative promoter Tim Eyman arrives to talk to reporters, Thursday, Oct. 15, 2020, at the Capitol in Olympia, Wash. The Washington Supreme Court on Thursday unanimously struck down Eyman's Initiative 976, a measure that would have steeply discounted the price of car registrations at $30 while gutting transportation budgets across Washington state. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren)
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Initiative promoter Tim Eyman arrives to talk to reporters, Thursday, Oct. 15, 2020, at the Capitol in Olympia, Wash. The Washington Supreme Court on Thursday unanimously struck down Eyman's Initiative 976, a measure that would have steeply discounted the price of car registrations at $30 while gutting transportation budgets across Washington state. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren)
Initiative promoter Tim Eyman arrives to talk to reporters at the Capitol in Olympia on Oct. 15. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren, file)

Herald staff

OLYMPIA — Anti-tax activist Tim Eyman of Bellevue must wait until December to defend himself against charges of illegally moving money between initiative campaigns and failing to disclose hundreds of thousands of dollars in political contributions.

A Thurston County Superior Court judge set Dec. 14 as the restart date of the former Mukilteo resident’s civil trial.

Judge James Dixon halted the legal proceedings Nov. 18 out of an abundance of caution after a state attorney informed the court that one of its trial team staff had a family member at home exhibiting cold symptoms, including a fever.

On Monday, the Attorney General’s Office emailed the court with an update that the test results for the family member did return positive for COVID-19. The email noted that the staff person has not exhibited symptoms and is awaiting results of their own test, and none of the state’s litigation team has exhibited symptoms.

Before the pause, there were two days of testimony in the case, which was spurred by the state’s 2017 lawsuit accusing Eyman of secretly moving campaign funds between initiatives, getting a $308,000 kickback from a signature-gathering firm and failing to report as political contributions hundreds of thousands of dollars received from friends and supporters.

This is a bench trial, meaning that Dixon will issue decision at the case’s conclusion.

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