ABOUT DAVID
I was born and raised in Anchorage, Alaska, and educated in the local public schools. My Dad was a typical small-town lawyer who was active in politics and the business life of the community. I was raised with an appreciation for public service and a sense of the importance of paying back for the advantages I enjoyed growing up.
I’m sure that’s a big part of the reason why later on as an attorney I was drawn to representing indigents and disadvantaged clients caught up in the justice system. I have always accepted cases important to the communities where I’ve lived, often pro bono.
I have continued that tradition here in Yavapai County where I have taken on cases for a reduced fee or even without fee when I believe there has been an injustice or unfairness in the judicial system.
My upbringing also explains why I have sought public office, first as a member of the state legislature, and now as a candidate for Yavapai County Attorney.
When I was nearing high school graduation my family left Alaska and moved to Washington, DC.
I was an academic kid and graduated high school a year early. I started college right away. At George Washington University I was a double major in history and philosophy and later did graduate work in American history before deciding on law school.
My first summer job was as an intern on Capitol Hill in the office of Senator Ernest Gruening, (D-AK).
My family was Republican and Gruening was a liberal Democrat who had served as Alaska’s Territorial Governor under FDR. There weren’t that many young Alaskans in DC looking for internships on Capitol Hill so Gruening took me on. This was in the mid-1960s. The Vietnam War was raging and the LBJ’s Great Society was coming on strong.
This was my first experience with the political world of Washington DC. I was 17 years old. My Internship created a lasting impression but not exactly in the way you might expect. I read bills, attended committee hearings and saw a lot of important people up close. Some of them, like Senator Fulbright and Everett Dirksen, and my own Senator Gruening were impressive men, men of integrity and real achievement. But I could see that many of the people who held political power and who were writing our nation’s laws were not of the first rank.
As a Senate Intern, while still in my teens, I bore witness to the birth of what came to be known as the Great Society. After a few months, I went back to school with deeply ambivalent feelings about the political world of Washington DC. It would be years before I changed my mind about the importance of government and politics. As a youngster, I set my course on getting an education and living the life of the mind.
After college, I landed a civil service appointment with the federal government, moved to Baltimore, and enrolled at the University of Baltimore Law School. It was a tough regimen for four years, working full-time in DC and keeping up with my studies. But I graduated in 1978 and passed the DC Bar. I worked in DC but lived in Baltimore. I never cared much for the culture of Washington DC. Too many careerists and operators. Baltimore seemed more real to me with its working-class culture and down-to-earth people who made things instead of Washington bureaucrats pushing paper and going to meetings all day.
I settled in the Fells Point area near the waterfront where I invested in rental properties. This became the foundation for the financial independence that within a few years allowed me to leave the government and strike out on my own as a private attorney. The Fells Point area was undergoing urban renewal and seeing an influx of professionals, including Senator Barbara Mikulski, “Ms. Gritty City” who had the area designated one of the first Historic Districts in the country. I learned a lot in Baltimore. I had never seen poverty up close. I had never seen urban decay, or big city machine politics and police corruption. I took some knocks in Baltimore. I’ve written about them in detail in a soon-to-be-released campaign biography. But overall, after a sheltered academic life, Baltimore was good for me. It toughened me up.
In 1985, I left the government and became an attorney in private practice, specializing in real estate, tax law, and trial work. I also took on a lot of criminal cases which became a regular part of my law practice. When people in trouble come to me for help, I don’t like to turn them away. Over the next twenty-five years, I handled over a thousand criminal cases, countless hearings, and over 200 jury trials. In 1991 I earned a CPA license in Maryland and was admitted to the Maryland Bar in 1992. In 2004 I was admitted to the Arizona Bar. I retain these Bar memberships to this day.
When my parents retired to Arizona in the early 1980’s, I began visiting regularly and spending part of the winter months in Scottsdale. In 2005 I bought a home and business in Prescott – the old Comfort Inn on White Spar Road – and settled here full-time in 2010. I became involved in the community and Republican politics.
Beginning in 2013, as General Counsel for the Citizens Tax Committee, I worked on campaigns against tax initiatives in Yavapai County. I am a political conservative and a Constitutionalist. I oppose high taxes and government overreach. My highest political value is freedom.
In 2016 I was elected to the Arizona Legislature and reelected in 2018, with the second highest vote count in the state for a House seat. In the legislature, my signature issue was criminal justice reform.
For decades, Arizona has had the 4th or 5th highest incarceration rate in the country and some of the toughest criminal laws anywhere. And Yavapai County has a higher incarceration rate than the state average. We send a disproportionate share of our residents to a crowded state prison system where the focus is on confinement with few resources for treatment and rehabilitation. Inmates from Yavapai County, particularly the vulnerable young, are often targeted for physical and emotional abuse and return to our community damaged and scarred for life.
Overzealous prosecution of low-level, non-violent offenders comes at a huge cost to taxpayers and has many negative consequences for the community. Those who violate the law and the rights of others should be held accountable. However, the stigma of a criminal conviction is not always in the best interest of the community or the offender in question. Yavapai County over-incarcerates so many low-level offenders that the 400-bed Camp Verde Jail is at risk of overcrowding. County taxpayers have been forced to build a new Jail in Prescott. We have already seen the first in a series of projected property tax increases to pay for a $70M jail that the voters turned down in 2014.
Yavapai County is a laggard in justice reform. Twelve of Arizona’s fifteen counties have Veterans Courts to screen meritorious cases at intake. They have been successful everywhere they’ve been tried. But in Yavapai County, our Veterans Court has no ability to screen cases at intake because the County Attorney’s Office does not support it.
In recent decades court systems across the country have established Community Courts, Domestic Violence Courts, and Mental Health Courts to address the social factors that sometimes lead otherwise law-abiding citizens into contact with the justice system. These innovations have proven effective in keeping people out of jail, avoiding the stigma of criminal conviction, and saving taxpayer dollars. Yavapai County has some catching up to do.
Expanding treatment and diversion opportunities for low-level, non-violent offenders will make room for violent predators like MS-13, and those who have contemptuously flouted our country’s immigration laws and are here illegally. This will free up the needed funds to make real improvements in public safety without the need to raise taxes. The Migrant Invasion that is overwhelming Arizona creates new challenges for law enforcement. I have pledged a zero-tolerance policy for illegals and have promised to support their detention and eventual deportation out of Yavapai County. We need to get our priorities straight and use our police and jail for those who are here illegally and threaten our security and way of life. Tough on crime? Absolutely. But also smart on crime. I’m running for County Attorney to meet the public safety needs of today and bring our justice system into the 21st Century.