Waggoner to serve as interim District Attorney

Gunnison-based Assistant District Attorney Jessica Waggoner has been appointed to serve as interim district attorney in the 7th Judicial District.

On Oct. 25, Gov. Jared Polis selected Waggoner to serve in the role from Nov. 1 through Jan. 14. The vacancy was created when current District Attorney Seth Ryan announced his resignation in September. Ryan was running unopposed in the coming election.

For Waggoner, the interim role will expand her workload, as the Gunnison office doesn’t have enough staff for her to scale back work even temporarily, she told the Times. Over the next two months, she’ll travel more to take on additional dockets across the 7th.

“I'm humbled and honored that I was chosen and that they felt that I was right to help this transition … I'm excited and obviously very nervous, because we are in a difficult spot right now, and I hope that I can get us through it as best we can,” she said.

Waggoner has worked in the 7th since 2008. In the early 2000s, she worked as an associate attorney at Gunnison-based Wilderson, O’Hayre, Dawson & Norris, P.C. and associate attorney at Montrose-based Fleming & Kidney, LLC. She graduated from Western Colorado University in 2000, and received her J.D. from the University of Denver Sturm College of Law in 2002.

Waggoner will yield the role at the start of the year to Montrose-based district attorney Anna Cooling. Cooling was appointed in mid-October by a Republican Party special nomination commission, tasked with producing a candidate before election day to take Ryan’s place on the ballot. Ryan’s name appeared on the ballot, but all votes cast for him counted toward Cooling.

(Abby Harrison can be contacted at 970.641.1414 or abby@gunnisontimes.com.)