WA legal professional basic files bar grievance versus Sequim lawyer over ‘frivolous’ election fraud scenario

The point out Legal professional General’s Business office has submitted a bar complaint versus a Sequim attorney who has filed a raft of lawsuits building baseless statements of popular voter fraud in Washington.

The grievance to the Office of Disciplinary Counsel will take goal at legal professional Virginia Shogren for a lawsuit in opposition to Gov. Jay Inslee that was not too long ago rejected as “frivolous” by the condition Supreme Court docket.

Shogren represented the Washington Election Integrity Coalition United in the Inslee lawsuit, which alleged widespread registration of noncitizens. The state Supreme Court dismissed the lawsuit as without having legal advantage and past month purchased Shogren and the coalition to pay far more than $28,000 in authorized penalties.

The bar grievance, signed by Solicitor Standard Noah Purcell, accuses Shogren of violating expert conduct policies when she “advanced frivolous authorized arguments and manufactured allegations of voter fraud with no foundation in point.”

The grievance cited claims by Shogren that her consumer experienced determined 50,000 noncitizens registered to vote in the condition, with out giving any basis or methodology for these assertions. A “casual check” of a sample of alleged noncitizens the coalition claimed experienced voted in 2020 showed the data was “not reliable,” Purcell wrote. For example, he wrote, a person voter discovered by the group had tweeted about turning out to be a naturalized citizen in 2019.

“Unfounded and baseless allegations, like all those made by Ms. Shogren have the predictable result of undermining the public’s religion in our democratic establishments,” Purcell wrote.

Shogren did not quickly answer to a ask for for comment. She was admitted to the condition bar in 2003 and has no other public disciplinary record, in accordance to the bar association’s on-line authorized listing.

The election coalition represented by Shogren has a number of additional lawsuits from elections officers pending in federal court which make unsubstantiated claims of enormous vote fraud. None of the group’s lawsuits across the state has been successful — mirroring the scenario nationally for this kind of scenarios, which echo former President Donald Trump’s untrue statements about the 2020 election.

The group’s chief, Tamborine Borrelli, is jogging for secretary of point out this calendar year, listing her bash affiliation as “America To start with (R).”

The Office environment of Disciplinary Counsel is billed with investigating ethics problems from attorneys in the condition. It can suggest punishment ranging from a formal warning to suspension or disbarment. Last selections are produced by court-appointed hearings officers, with all suspensions and disbarments reviewed by the point out Supreme Court docket.

The criticism signed by Purcell does not find any individual punishment, but asks the workplace to “look into this matter and choose more action as you deem suitable.”