CHAFFEE COUNTY, Colo. — For a prosecutor in charge of enforcing the law, 11th Judicial District Attorney Linda Stanley now finds herself on the wrong side of an investigation.
More than a hundred miles from her office in Salida, the Colorado Supreme Court will now hear a complaint into the Republican District Attorney for Chafee, Fremont, Park and Custer Counties. Stanley faces a long list of allegations outlined in court filings, including launching a secret investigation into the judge presiding over the Suzanne Morphew murder case. She was the one to bring charges against Suzanne's husband, Barry Morphew. Stanley dropped those charges before going to trial.
"Using resources in that manner clearly designed to intimidate a judge or if it was for retribution, it’s so wrong," said former District Court Judge Ramsey Lama. "It’s unethical."
Lama wants Stanley to lose her law license after he says she secretly investigated his family based on conspiracy theories in a YouTube video. Court filings also accuse her of providing information to "True Crime" podcasters while withholding information from defense attorneys, showing up late to court, and repeated discovery violations.
After the complaint was filed by the Attorney Regulation Counsel to the Supreme Court last week, Stanley gets 28 days to respond. From there, the case proceeds much like a civil case. The evidence will eventually be heard by a Presiding Disciplinary Judge who then will make a ruling.
Legal experts say there’s a very real possibility Stanley loses her law license and is disbarred.
"This is a far-ranging set of complaints and, if proven, should warrant significant discipline against District Attorney Linda Stanley," said 9NEWS legal expert Scott Robinson.
In Colorado, district attorneys are required to have a law license. If they lose their license, another lawyer takes over the office.
We know that because that’s already happened once to Linda Stanley.
Court documents show in 2022, Stanley’s law license was temporarily suspended after she failed to complete mandatory legal education requirements. A prosecutor named Mark Hurlbert was appointed to take over the job while Stanley worked to regain her certification.
Now, she could lose it permanently.
"I think an elected official who is the top prosecutor using investigative resources, taxpayer dollars, to investigate a judge on nothing, totally baseless, because they didn’t like their rulings, that’s scary," Lama said. "I think if you’re engaging in that kind of conduct you have no business being a DA."
Even if the state launched a patterns and practices investigation into Stanley, the Supreme Court complaint would likely be much quicker to determine whether Stanley did anything wrong.
In theory, locals in Stanley's district could also try and launch a recall petition. After speaking with county commissioners in Stanley's four-county district, that seems unlikely to happen.
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