SALT LAKE CITY — Former Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff is demanding that he be prosecuted separately from his successor, John Swallow, in the corruption case against the two.
In court papers filed Thursday and obtained by FOX 13, Shurtleff accuses Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill of a “sleight of hand” by referring to the two former attorneys general as “co-defendants.”
“The State chose to charge Messrs. Shurtleff and Swallow in completely independent Informations with completely independent Counts pursuant to completely independent Declarations of Probable Cause alleging almost entirely independent facts all under completely separate, non-consecutive case numbers,” wrote Rick Van Wagoner, Shurtleff’s attorney. “That ship has sailed. Mr. Shurtleff is charged with ten counts and Mr. Swallow thirteen.”
In the filing, Van Wagoner accused Gill of a media campaign to tie the two cases together.
Read the filing here:
Shurtleff asks the court to ensure that the cases are tried separately, and strike the words “co-defendants” from any court filings in the case.
The former attorneys general are facing a long list of charges, including bribery and evidence tampering. They are accused of soliciting contributions and offering assistance to people under investigation or facing charges by the attorney general’s office.
Both men face up to 30 years in prison, if convicted.
