Embattled state Supreme Court Justice Richard Sanders missed a deadline this week to formally challenge a complaint against him by the state’s judicial watchdog agency. Now he faces disciplinary action that could include his removal from the bench.
Meanwhile, at least one of his supporters is digging deep into the role Snohomish County prosecutors played in leveling the initial allegations.
Sanders let a deadline pass Monday to challenge charges that he violated three rules governing judges’ behavior during his January 2003 tour of the state’s sex predator center on McNeil Island.
The complaint by the state Commission on Judicial Conduct directed Sanders to respond by April 26.
"They’re wrong about that. We may have a fight with them," said Kurt Bulmer, Sanders’ attorney. Bulmer said he would fax the response to the commission Tuesday night "to avoid controversy."
The complaint accuses Sanders of creating the appearance of impropriety by having conversations with more than 15 convicted sex offenders whose cases were pending before the state’s high court.
Sanders spoke for so long with the sex offenders that he had to take a later ferry back from the island. The commission alleged his conduct could undermine public confidence in the integrity and independence of judges.
Sanders’ failure to respond means the commission can assume he has admitted the factual allegations and can now decide his discipline, Barrie Althoff, the commission’s executive director, said Tuesday.
Sanders, of Bellevue, did not return a phone call Tuesday.
"He didn’t do anything wrong, and the commission knows it," Bulmer said.
The commission still must conduct a hearing on the case. Sanders could face sanctions, suspension or removal from the bench.
Katrina Pflaumer, a former U.S. attorney hired to represent the Commission on Judicial Conduct in its prosecution of Sanders, said the justice’s lawyers discussed a possible resolution to the complaint. No agreement was reached in those discussions, which happened before and after the charges were filed.
The complaint against Sanders was initiated in March 2003 by prosecutors in Snohomish and King counties. The local connection didn’t become public until a story in The Herald earlier this month.
That same day, James Kwon of Bellevue sent Snohomish County prosecutors a public records request seeking all e-mails sent and received by Snohomish County Prosecuting Attorney Janice Ellis, dating back to January 2003.
Kwon also sought all e-mails for Mark Roe, the county’s chief criminal deputy prosecutor, and Seth Fine, the senior deputy prosecutor who oversees the appellate unit.
Prosecutors checked public records and discovered that Kwon is married to an attorney who worked as a law clerk for Sanders at the Supreme Court in the late 1990s.
On April 14, Dave Wold, the public disclosure officer for the prosecutor’s office, sent Kwon a letter explaining that meeting his request would be difficult, if not impossible.
"It would help expedite our search, and save valuable taxpayer money and resources, if you would narrow your request to specific case files or categories or records," Wold wrote. He then provided detailed instructions on how to obtain e-mail records revolving around Sanders and sex predators.
"I can assure you that limiting your request to the subject you are actually interested in will in no way limit your access to records you are seeking and will greatly shorten the time in which we are able to provide those records to you," Wold wrote.
Kwon responded on April 17 with a three-page public records request, making it clear that his interest was confined to what prosecutors may have been writing or saying about Sanders, the state Supreme Court and sexual predators.
Kwon and his wife did not respond to five telephone calls and an e-mail seeking comment.
Roe and Fine said their office is attempting to comply with the public records request, but even in its current form the request could cover more than 1,000 records.
"I’m an appellate attorney," Fine said. "Virtually every brief I write comments on cases decided by the Supreme Court."
Among the records Fine said he thinks must be copied and turned over are draft chapters of a manual he and other prosecutors have been writing about practicing appellate law in Washington.
Roe said prosecutors had concerns about Sanders’ conduct at the sex predator center and its implications for cases they had pending before the court.
They brought their concerns to the Commission on Judicial Conduct and asked Sanders to recuse himself from cases dealing with sexual predators’ challenges to the law that keeps them locked up indefinitely in the prisonlike treatment center.
Roe said prosecutors aren’t happy about spending time and effort to meet Kwon’s demands for records about Sanders. Even so, Roe said he’s not blaming Sanders for what he considers a waste of time public money.
"We are prosecutors. We deal in proof," Roe said. "Somebody is going to have to prove it to me that a justice would stoop to this. Until then, I don’t believe it."
Reporter Scott North: 425-339-3431 or north@heraldnet.com.
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