Conover shares details of State Bar diversion program she agreed to take

Pima County Attorney Laura Conover will have one year to complete her diversion program with the Arizona State Bar, details of the agreement show.

Conover made the agreement documents public over the weekend, despite the State Bar saying details should be kept private.

“(Here) is the diversion agreement between myself and the State Bar,” Conover said of her participation in the program that followed complaints lodged against her two years ago. “Because it was conveyed to me as a confidential document, we first sought clear guidance that it could be properly released to the public.”

The two-page document outlines the terms of Conover’s continuing education program called the “10 Deadly Sins of Conflict.” It also lists punitive action that could result if she fails to finish the program in the allotted time.

“My goal is and will be to maintain professional and legal ethics,” Conover wrote at the time she released the document. She noted she made the document public immediately after clarifying with the State Bar that she could release the document herself.

“Like every single licensed attorney in Arizona, I am committed to continue learning, now and every day, and for as long as I hold this office,” she wrote, impressing, once again, that a diversion agreement will not be used by the State Bar for serious conduct.

“Generally, diversion is only available when the alleged conduct is minor,” she noted.

Without agreeing to the diversion plan, Conover would have been referred to the Attorney Discipline Probable Cause Committee for further action.

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There have been 22 complaints lodged against Conover by David Berkman, a former top prosecutor in the office.

Berkman filed the complaints “based on false statements Conover made during her last campaign, false statements concerning her employees, failing to represent the Board of Supervisors in an ethical manner, and failing to ethically administer justice in the Louis Taylor case,” he said.

Berkman has been a steady critic of Conover’s performance since she took office in 2021. He’s criticized what he said was a conflict of interest in her handling of cases involving Louis Taylor, who is seeking compensation from Pima County and the city of Tucson for his long former incarceration in the 1970 Pioneer Hotel Fire, in which 29 people died. After saying during her 2020 campaign for county attorney that the justice system made a mistake in not exonerating Taylor, Conover initiated a process after she took office to exonerate him but later withdrew it.

Berkman also filed complaints over the massive turnover in the office and sued her office over failing to provide public records.

Conover maintains she did nothing wrong despite agreeing to the diversion.

As part of the diversion, Conover is required to hand in her handwritten or typed notes while viewing the program as proof of her completion, the agreement states.

Furthermore, Conover will meet with her screening investigation counsel to discuss the rules of professional conduct as they “pertain to the issues that gave rise to the charge.”

According to the State Bar’s guidelines, the purpose of the diversion program is to “protect the public through educational, remedial and rehabilitative programs so that attorneys modify ... conduct that does not comply with the Arizona Rules of Professional Conduct.”