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Court docket disbars ex-prosecutor convicted for…
Ethics
Court docket disbars ex-prosecutor convicted for secret recordings, says he created impression ‘justice is on the market’
By Debra Cassens Weiss
July 2, 2025, 12:26 pm CDT
A former part-time prosecutor convicted for secretly recording intimate photographs of two lovers, together with a girl he prosecuted, has been disbarred. (Picture from Shutterstock)
A former part-time prosecutor convicted for secretly recording intimate photographs of two lovers, together with a girl he prosecuted, has been disbarred.
The Wisconsin Supreme Court docket revoked the legislation license of Daniel P. Steffen, a former assistant district legal professional, in a July 1 opinion famous by the Authorized Career Weblog. The state supreme courtroom rejected as inadequate a referee’s advice for an 18-month suspension.
Steffen can petition for reinstatement underneath Wisconsin legislation after 5 years. He license revocation was retroactive to June 2023, the date of a abstract suspension.
Steffen was convicted in April 2023 for violating a Wisconsin legislation barring the seize of intimate representations of an individual with out the sufferer’s information or consent. He spent 10 months in jail earlier than being freed underneath an earned launch program.
Ethics regulators alleged that Steffen violated an expert conduct rule offering that attorneys mustn’t commit legal conduct that adversely impacts their honesty, trustworthiness or health as a lawyer. The Wisconsin Supreme Court docket mentioned it’s incorrect to focus solely on the legal violation, nevertheless, in assessing the ethics violation.
The referee had discovered that the 2 girls voluntarily entered into relationships with Steffen, and there was no quid professional quo. However Steffen’s conduct with the girl he prosecuted “creates the impression that justice is on the market, and that public officers may be purchased off with sexual acts,” the Wisconsin Supreme Court docket mentioned.
The state supreme courtroom additionally famous that the second lady had sought recommendation on how one can keep away from prosecution for an alleged act of property injury after the sexual encounter, making a “subtext” about forbearing prosecution regardless of no specific dialog to that impact.
“In brief,” the state supreme courtroom mentioned, “the general nature of legal professional Steffen’s misconduct doesn’t merely contain recording sexual acts with out the consent of his victims; it entails an assistant district legal professional abusing his place of energy and authority.”
The referee had indicated that the file just isn’t very clear on “who was getting used and who was the person,” an assertion rejected by the Wisconsin Supreme Court docket.
“Each victims had been weak by the actual fact that legal professional Steffen was an assistant district legal professional and held the ability of the justice system over their head just like the proverbial Sword of Damocles,” the state supreme courtroom mentioned.
The Wisconsin Supreme Court docket summarized the alleged wrongdoing based mostly on the referee’s findings and stipulated info.
The lady Steffen prosecuted had been charged in Burnett County, Wisconsin, with violating a harassment restraining order defending the daddy of their youngster. The underlying legal criticism alleged that Steffen gave the girl his private cellphone quantity on the preliminary pretrial convention in June 2018. They exchanged flirty textual content messages and mentioned going out for a drink, the Wisconsin Supreme Court docket mentioned.
Per week later, Steffen mailed a proposed judgment of conviction to the girl that may permit her to wipe her file clear if she pleaded responsible, dedicated no additional legal acts, and didn’t contact the daddy outdoors of visitation for a specified time interval. The preliminary proposal requiring a clear file for one yr was decreased to 6 months on the plea listening to.
The lady pleaded responsible, and the identical day, Steffen and the sufferer started exchanging sexual textual content messages. In July 2018, the district legal professional’s workplace acquired a referral alleging that the girl violated the harassment injunction in opposition to her youngster’s father. Steffen allegedly advised a paralegal that the violation wouldn’t be prosecuted. Steffen and the girl started a sexual relationship the identical month.
The district legal professional’s workplace acquired a second harassment referral on the finish of July 2018. There was no prosecution. Steffen had maintained that he didn’t make the prosecution choice on both referral. He additionally testified at his disciplinary listening to that he thought that the matter in opposition to the girl was closed on the time of the preliminary settlement.
The case in opposition to the girl was in the end dismissed based mostly on a January 2019 movement by the district legal professional’s workplace.
Steffen was accused within the legal criticism of recording secret movies of sexual acts with the girl on an iPad on his dresser pointed on the mattress. Though the legal fees mentioned there was no consent to 2 recordings of the girl, there was testimony at trial that she had consented to some recordings of different sexual encounters.
The lady disclosed her relationship with Steffen to a particular agent whereas jailed on one other matter. She asserted that she had intercourse with an assistant dsitrict legal professional in Burnett County in change for leniency on a legal case.
The second lady started a sexual relationship with Steffen in 2017 after they started exchanging sexual textual content messages. The key recording was made in August of that yr. After the sexual encounter, Steffen spoke to the sufferer about her considerations about attainable legal fees for damaging the mailbox of her daughter’s father.
Steffen later advised the girl that he recorded the encounter however deleted it from his cellphone after she grew to become offended and requested him to take away it. The video remained on his iPad, nevertheless. The lady later tried to “blackmail” Steffen throughout an investigation of the recordings by providing to withhold her cellphone quantity from investigators if the lawyer forgave a invoice owed by one in every of her buddies, the referee discovered.
The referee famous that each girls had exchanged intimate photographs with Steffen in textual content messages and mentioned that difficult the seriousness of the offense. He additionally discovered that each girls voluntarily entered into sexual relationships with Steffen with out coercion or threats.
Steffen had mentioned he was at “an emotional low level” on the time of the offenses. He cooperated within the disciplinary investigation.
Steffen was admitted to legislation observe in Wisconsin in September 1998 and has no prior disciplinary historical past.
He didn’t instantly reply to an ABA Journal e mail request for remark despatched to an e mail handle listed by the State Bar of Wisconsin. Nor did he instantly reply to the Journal’s voicemail.
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