SPRINGFIELD – Former U.S. attorney Stephen Wigginton deserves discipline for driving drunk, according to the Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission.
The commission filed a complaint in December, stating Wigginton committed criminal acts that reflected adversely on his honesty and fitness.
Peter Rotskoff, counsel to commission administrator Jerome Larkin, requested assignment of a panel for a hearing.
Wigginton
Wigginton placed his law license on inactive status in 2020, after his third in arrest in three years.
The first arrest, in 2017, made the most noise.
Steering a Cadillac from Interstate 55-70 to U. S. Route 40 at Troy, he left the pavement and proceeded about 100 yards on turf.
He knocked down a fence, dropped into a ditch, drove out of it, and kept going.
Police found him on a nearby overpass with his engine grinding and smoking and a headlight missing.
He refused a breath test and they arrested him.
He pleaded guilty, and Madison County associate judge Luther Simmons imposed a $1,500 fine and 12 months on supervision.
He released Wigginton in three months.
On New Year’s Eve in 2018, Edwardsville police saw Wigginton swerving between lanes near Plummer Drive and Commerce Drive.
They stopped him and smelled alcohol.
They asked questions and heard inconsistent answers.
He failed a sobriety test and refused a breath test, and they arrested him.
Special prosecutor David Rands made no progress for most of 2019.
On Dec. 26 of that year, Wigginton’s vehicle and another collided at Route 157 and Club Centre Court.
Police found him at a nearby restaurant.
They smelled alcohol and noted unsteady feet and bloodshot eyes.
He failed sobriety tests but agreed to submit to a breath test.
It measured his alcohol content at .23 percent, almost three times the limit.
They arrested him, putting him on defense on two tickets at once.
Pleading guilty to both would have made him a felon, because Illinois counts a third drunk driving conviction that way.
Prosecutor Rands spared Wigginton from that result by agreeing to dismiss one ticket in exchange for a plea on the other.
Associate Judge Philip Alfeld fined Wigginton $2,800, placed him on two years probation, and ordered 160 hours of community service.