AHC Rules No Cause to Discipline in Felony Case

Commissioner John Kopp of the Administrative Hearing Commission recently issued a ruling on DIFP complaint against bondsman Donald Christian. In his ruling, Kopp said that the DIFP has no cause to discipline Christian’s license.

The DIFP complaint asked for permission to discipline Christian because he is a convicted felon. According to the complaint, Christian pled guilty in 1998 to possession of a controlled substance. The decision finds that Christian was sentenced to three years in prison and was remanded to custody of the sheriff. Casenet seems to indicate that Christian was given a suspended execution of sentence and given five years probation and jail time on a related misdemeanor charges.

Christian was licensed in 2005, after the law was amended to include a 15 year clause for felony convictions. Initially, Christian was licensed by the DIFP despite his conviction. In November of last year, Christian was arrested in Lincoln County on new charges. Those charges were later dropped. After Christian’s arrest, the DIFP filed a complaint against Christian seeking discipline against him for his felony conviction in 1998.

In its ruling, the AHC said that that found no authority to discipline Christian on the basis of a version of the disciplinary statute that existed at the time Christian was licensed in 2005. The Commission ruled that they could only use the disciplinary statute that was in effect in 1998 when Christian pled guilty. The commission further stated that it could not use the pre-2005 version of statute because the DIFP did not rely on it in its complaint. The DIFP filed a motion for rehearing and leave to amend complaint on June 1st.