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A shining star in dark election trial [Jenny Durkan]
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Candidate
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| Contributor | Ralphie |
| Last Edited | Ralphie Jun 18, 2005 11:24am |
| Category | Profile |
| News Date | Jun 18, 2005 11:00am |
| Description | For lawyer Jenny Durkan, it was "an honor and a privilege" to deliver the Democrats' closing argument early this month in the trial over the 2004 governor's race -- but it wasn't the peak moment of the drama for her.
That high point in the case -- and in Durkan's multifaceted career -- was reached later, when Chelan County Superior Court Judge John Bridges dismissed the Republican challenge to the victory of Gov. Christine Gregoire.
Durkan, 47, comes by healthy disagreement naturally. Her father, Martin Durkan, who died during the election trial, was a power in the state Senate in the 1960s and ran for governor and Congress. With seven children in the family, he presided over a lively debating society in his own house, in Issaquah.
She's represented clients in several high-profile cases, including: the family of retired firefighter Stanley Stevenson, which sued the state and county after he was stabbed to death in 1997 by a released mental patient; a 32-year-old woman who brought a lawsuit against her father alleging childhood sexual abuse; former Seattle City Councilman John Manning, who was accused of assaulting his wife; and Kari Tupper, who filed a sexual misconduct complaint against her boss, then-U.S. Sen. Brock Adams.
She has been active in the political arena as well.
Durkan was an adviser to former Seattle Mayor Norm Rice and served as executive counsel to Gov. Mike Lowry in the 1990s. She's been the part-time legal consultant on Gregoire's successful campaigns for state attorney general and governor, and she counts Gregoire as a personal friend.
A self-described "good old-fashioned progressive Democrat," Durkan has been mentioned as a potential candidate for the King County Council, Congress, state attorney general and governor, but she's never run for office. |
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