Seattle mayor’s accuser seeks venue change

SEATTLE — The lawyers for the man suing Seattle Mayor Ed Murray for alleged sexual abuse are seeking to have the case moved to Pierce County, Washington, and want sanctions brought against Murray’s lawyer for “concocting and spreading a false narrative” that their law firm is “anti-gay.”

Lincoln Beauregard, the Seattle lawyer who represents Murray’s accuser, Delvonn Heckard, contends in a motion filed Thursday that the mayor and his legal team, headed by Robert Sulkin, “have tainted the possibility of hosting a fair trial in King County by spreading a false narrative about Mr. Heckard’s attorneys and the motivations underpinning the filing of the lawsuit.”

King County is one of three Washington counties that are included in the Seattle–Tacoma–Bellevue metropolitan area. The others are Snohomish County to the north, and Pierce County to the south.

Beauregard’s motion says the mayor’s attorneys’ have violated ethics standards “by concocting and then spreading a false narrative that Lincoln C. Beauregard and Jack Connelly Jr. fabricated this lawsuit to perpetuate an ‘anti-gay’ and/or homophobic agenda.”

The motion seeks a change of venue for the case, which now has an April 2018 trial date. It also requests that the court sanction Sulkin’s legal team at least $5,000 US for ethics violations.

Sulkin did not immediately respond to messages left for him.

Murray, 62, has vehemently denied allegations by Heckard and three other men who have separately accused him of paying them for sex when they were teenagers in the 1980s. Heckard is the only party to the lawsuit.

Murray a longtime gay-rights champion and first-term Seattle mayor who last week dropped out of his reelection bid because of the scandal, has blamed the allegations on an anti-gay political conspiracy.

The mayor and his team have pointed to the politics of one of Beauregard’s legal partners, Connelly, to bolster the conspiracy theory. Among his conservative stances, Connelly favours traditional marriage and supported an initiative to repeal a state policy allowing transgender people to use the bathroom of the gender with which they identify.

Connelly, a Tacoma Democrat and practising Catholic, has since taken issue with the mayor’s claims, contending he holds no homophobic resentment and isn’t involved in Heckard’s case.

Heckard and one other accuser, Lavon Jones, have both said they are gay. Heckard, Jones and two other men who have accused Murray — Jeff Simpson and Lloyd Anderson — all have denied politics motivated their allegations against the mayor.

Beauregard’s motion described Murray’s conspiracy theory as a “defamatory narrative” that has been spread to the public by Seattle media, including the Seattle Times.

A hearing on the motion is set for May 26.