Ex-assistant prosecutor loses law license for year

Former assistant Butler County prosecutor Jason Phillabaum, once the front-runner for appointment to the top spot, has been suspended from practicing law for one year by the Ohio Supreme Court because he ordered the addition of criminal charges to an indictment even though they had not been considered by a grand jury.

The suspension came more than two years after Phillabaum pleaded guilty in 2013 to a misdemeanor criminal charge of “dereliction of duty.”

In February, the state’s attorney disciplinary board recommended that six months of the suspension be stayed, but the court on Tuesday rejected the stay and imposed a full-year suspension, court officials said.

In July 2014, the disciplinary panel held a two-day hearing in Columbus in which many employees of the Butler County prosecutor’s office testified, as did Phillabaum.

The disciplinary counsel found fault with Phillabaum’s handling of the case of Tyree Johnson.

In December 2010, assistant prosecutor Josh Muennich submitted charges to a Butler County grand jury against a defendant accused of aggravated robbery and felonious assault. Phillabaum reviewed the indictment a week later and told a legal assistant to add gun specifications to it. Muennich refused to sign the altered indictment, but Phillabaum signed it.

Based on his conduct, Phillabaum was indicted in May 2012 on charges of forgery, dereliction of duty, tampering with records, interference with civil rights and using a sham legal process. After Phillabaum entered the guilty plea to dereliction of duty, a visiting judge sentenced him to 90 days of suspended jail time if he completed one year of community control and probation.

The attorney disciplinary board determined that Phillabaum also violated four professional conduct rules, including one prohibiting lawyers from lying to a tribunal and another that bars conduct that harms the administration of justice.