When Judge Stauffer Retires, Who Will Hear Wasco County Criminal Cases?

Pictured: Judge Janet L. Stauffer, sits on the bench at the Wasco Courthouse. In 2010 Stauffer became the first woman to serve as a Circuit Court Judge in Wasco County.

By Cole Goodwin

Presiding 7th District Judge Janet Stauffer, age 61, has announced that she will not be running for reelection following the completion of her 2nd six-year term as a Wasco County Circuit Court Judge in May of 2022. Although she will not be running reelection, she will continue to serve as a judge 35 days a year for the next five years. She said that her decision to retire came out of a desire to spend more time with her family and to travel. 

Stauffer also said that her replacement would have to be well versed in criminal law as the majority of the work they would be completing would likely be criminal work. 

For the majority of the past eleven years, Stauffer has been the only Wasco County Circuit Court Judge that could hear criminal cases in Wasco County due to an unusually long-standing conflict of interest held by the other Wasco County Circuit Judge John Wolf which has led him to recuse himself from hearing any criminal cases in Wasco County for more than a decade. 

What is a conflict of interest? 

Conflict of interest is a term used to explain why a judge cannot be involved in a case in which a close friend or family member is involved. According to the Code of Conduct for Judicial Employees, Judges must recuse themself (excuse themselves) from hearing cases in which they may have a potential conflict of interest to ensure impartial judgment of the case. 

The reason Judge Wolf cannot hear criminal cases in Wasco or Hood River County is that he has had a long-standing conflict of interest because his wife Leslie Wolf worked as the Deputy District Attorney (and later as Chief Deputy District Attorney) at the Wasco County DA’s office from 1998 up until 2020. Upon leaving her position at the Wasco County DA’s office, she went to work in the Hood River DA’s office as a Deputy District Attorney. 

CCCNews reached out to the Wolfs for comment in phone calls and emails, but neither had responded at the time of this being published.

Senior Judge Paul Crowley said that it was not unusual for Judges and attorneys to be married or for there to be conflicts of interest. However, what was highly unusual about this particular case was just how long the conflict of interest had been an ongoing issue for the county. 

“What is uncommon is the standing conflict,” said Crowley.

Usually, a conflict of interest is case-specific, something that might hinder a judge from hearing a single case or a series of cases due to their personal connections to either a close friend or family member who is involved in the case. These types of conflict of interest are considered a routine part of ensuring an impartial judgment of cases and do not usually create a need to change daily operations or put undue stress on other judges or the judicial system. However, the standing conflict has created undue stress on judicial operations and for years has created daily procedural difficulties for the Wasco County judicial system.

In larger districts with more judges, it would, perhaps, be easier to work around the conflict, but in the 7th District where there are just four judges to cover five counties (Wasco, Hood River, Sherman, Gilliam, Wheeler), the standing conflict has made it more difficult to reallocate the work. 

The 7th District Circuit Court employs four judges, Judge John A. Olson, Judge Janet Stauffer, Judge Karen Ostrye, and Judge John Wolf.

Two judges are assigned to work primarily in Wasco county and two judges are assigned to work primarily in Hood River county.

The four judges rotate responsibility to hear cases in Sherman, Gilliam and Wheeler counties.

Image Source: Oregon Judicial Branch

The conflict impacts the 7th District Circuit Court in many ways. 

For example, if Judge Stauffer is unable to hear a criminal matter for any reason, Judge Wolf is unable to help, and the district often has to call in judges from other areas to assist. 

“For eleven years, except for about a one- to two-month period, I have been the only judge that does criminal work in Wasco County,” said Judge Stauffer. “If Judge Wolf’s conflicts continue, it will be very important that my replacement be well versed in criminal law. Judge Wolf’s inability to hear criminal cases in Wasco and Hood River counties impacts the dockets significantly.”

When asked if she felt that there was a fair division of labor despite Wolf’s inability to hear criminal cases Judge Stauffer responded “Absolutely not...the bulk of our work is criminal.” 

“We have a huge criminal caseload,” said Judge Stauffer. 

According to statistics in recent Oregon Judicial Branch Reports more than 70% of cases filed in Wasco County are criminal cases although 52% of the criminal cases were violations. (Violations are petty offenses such as minor traffic violations etc. that are typically punishable by fines but not jail time.) 

An average of about 10,000 cases are filed in the 7th District Circuit Court every year of which the majority of the cases filed are criminal cases in Wasco and Hood River county. The annual average of cases filed in Wasco County every year sits around 5,400, of which more than 4,200 of them were criminal cases.

CORRECTION: CCC News previously reported that from 2018-2020 over 14,000 criminal cases were filed in Wasco County alone.

Judge Wolf brought to CCC News attention, that of those roughly 14,000 cases, the majority of cases, some 11,625 of them, were violations.

Wolf clarified that he could handle violation matters in which there was no connected criminal charge.

Once the violations are removed from the case counts there were 3,197 criminal and juvenile cases filed and 4,293 civil cases filed in the 2018 to 2020 period. 

“Judge Stauffer and I both handle violation matters,” said Wolf “Generally, Judge Stauffer handles them if there is a connected criminal case such as a traffic violation and a driving under the influence criminal charge stemming from the same incident.”

“I handle violation matters when there is no connected criminal charge,” said Wolf “That includes presiding over all those violations trials and reviewing all the letters submitted by defendants regarding their tickets.” 

“The district also has a violations bureau which also handles violations when defendants simply wish to enter a guilty plea and pay their fine,” said Wolf.

Conflict of Interest Impacts Both Wasco and Hood River County

“In the past, one of the judges from Hood River would come over and help me with the criminal caseload,” said Stauffer “And when that happened Judge Wolf would go to Hood River. We can’t even do that now, because now he has a conflict of interest in Hood River because that’s where his wife is working.” 

One would think that at that point when his wife began working in Hood River, Judge Wolf would have finally been able to return to hearing criminal cases in Wasco County. However, due to recent Brady Material allegations which surfaced involving his wife and former The Dalles Police Officer Jeffery Kienlen, Judge Wolf recused himself after receiving a judicial ethics opinion saying he should recuse himself from cases involving his wife, the Wasco County DA’s office or the Hood River DA’s office entirely.

Consequently, Wolf can no longer hear criminal cases in either Hood River or Wasco County.

“They should have fixed the problem years ago,” said Judge Stauffer, “Judge Wolf and Leslie Wolf should not have been working in the same courthouse because it created a conflict that was debilitating for our court.”

Despite the differences in workload, Judge Stauffer said she had a good working relationship with Judge Wolf.

“Judge Wolf and I get along very well, it's just that there’s always an elephant in the courtroom,” she said.

One of the issues that the conflict of interest has caused for the court is that neither Wolf nor Stauffer can do criminal settlement conferences. 

A felony settlement conference is an informal, confidential process managed by a judge who is not the judge hearing the case.

“We can’t do criminal settlement conferences,” said Stauffer. “I can’t do a criminal settlement conference because then I couldn’t do the criminal trial, because I’d have a conflict.”

“We don’t have that in our county anymore,” said Stauffer, “It’s a disservice to our district.”

“It’s embarrassing, it’s not how a judicial district should run, and it’s hard to admit, because I’m the presiding judge, but there’s nothing I could have done about what’s going on across the hall,” said Stauffer.

Despite being unable to work criminal cases in Wasco and Hood River County Judge Wolf is not out of work. He can still hear civil and non-criminal cases in all five counties that the 7th District Circuit Court presides over. 

“He does basically everything else he can,” said Stauffer, “He can do any civil type cases that don’t involve a criminal defendant. “

The 7th District Circuit Court is unusual in that it is the only district in Oregon to encompass five counties. Judge Wolf can also still hear criminal cases in Sherman, Wheeler, and Gilliam counties. 

However, all the criminal and civil cases in Sherman, Wheeler, and Gilliam counties combined have remained relatively small compared to the criminal cases in Wasco and Hood River counties. From 2018-2020 Sherman, Wheeler, and Gilliam counties filed only 1,196 civil and criminal cases compared to the 23,320 criminal cases filed in Hood River and Wasco County during those same years, according to the Oregon Judicial Information Network. 

If Judge Wolf were to take on every criminal and non-criminal case in Sherman, Wheeler, and Gilliam and every non-criminal case in Wasco County he might just break even on his caseloads with Judge Stauffer. 

But Stauffer said that work in the other three counties is limited.

“We have one judge out there about every other week. At the beginning of the conflict, we were sending Judge Wolf out there more than anyone else, but then we resumed a more regular rotation.”

Even if caseloads can be evened out there are also is a career opportunities cost and an emotional labor cost associated with working primarily in criminal law.

“I love being a judge, and to tell you the truth, I really like being a criminal judge, although that was never my law career. I just wish that I could have been a true circuit court judge,” said Stauffer.

Criminal law and civil law are very different beasts. 

Ruling on a divorce, land disputes, or a name change may at times be brutal but it doesn’t always come close to the mental and emotional burden of judging domestic violence, parental rights, sexual assault, crimes against minors, and drug abuse cases

“I’ve read horrible things,” said Stauffer. 

Plus there is the extra burden of being on call day and night for warrants, and jail housing.

“In addition to the criminal courtroom work, the judges handling criminal work also approve placements at the jail and warrants outside of regular hours. You have to have your iPad and judicial phone with you at all times,” said Stauffer.

Judge Wolf’s conflict of interest meant that for the past eleven years he has not been able to be on-call for criminal work in Wasco County. However in the past five months, since his wife went to work at the Hood River DA’s office he is able to be in the on-call rotation to issue warrants as long as the DA hasn’t charged anybody involved yet. 

Judge Stauffer said she had asked Judge Wolf numerous times to do something to resolve the conflict-of-interest issue so that she could act in her position as a ‘normal’ circuit court judge, but that her requests had gone nowhere. 

“I kind of hit a wall every once in a while, about once a year, I’d go down and talk to Judge Wolf and tell him you’ve got to solve this problem. I was getting really burned out. It wasn’t fair,” said Stauffer. 

It’s Up to the Voters Now

When asked who was responsible for fixing the issue going forward, Stauffer responded, “The voters. He’s up for election next year.”

Wolf ran unopposed in his last race, and if no one runs against him in May of 2022 he will likely be a Wasco County Judge again and the issues currently facing the Wasco County Judicial system will likely continue. At the time of publishing, Wolf had not answered three of CCC New’s inquiries into whether he was running for office again in 2022. 

Stauffer said she hoped that a woman would fill either her or Wolf’s position in the upcoming election. 

“I was the first and only woman Judge ever in our district until Karen Ostrye was appointed in Hood River, and I’d really like to see a woman fill the position,” said Stauffer. 

Stauffer said she wanted to be clear that she was not retiring because of Judge Wolf’s conflict of interest, “It’s just time,” she said. 

Next year, Judge Karen Ostrye will likely become the presiding Judge in the 7th District Circuit Court. 

More About the 2022 Elections

Pictured: Wasco County Courthouse

The 7th District Circuit Court Judge elections will be held in May of 2022. 

Circuit Court Judges make about $150,000 a year and are elected to six-year terms. 

Candidates running for Judge in the 7th District Circuit Court must be citizens of the United States, an attorney, under 75 years of age, and be a resident or have their primary office in either Wasco, Sherman, Wheeler or Gilliam county.

Current Circuit Court Judges include