In August, Phoenix New Times reported on evidence that Adel may have suffered domestic violence at the hands of her husband, David DeNitto. Though some close to Adel harbored suspicions, Adel successfully hid her alleged abuse from many in her office even as her issues with substance abuse spilled into the public sphere.
However, the State Bar had reason to suspect Adel was a domestic violence victim, according to a document included in the bar’s 2022 investigation into Adel. In a sworn affidavit submitted to the bar in March of that year, county attorney’s office Director of Communications Karla Navarrete described a phone conversation with Adel — which Adel made while hiding in a closet — in which the county prosecutor revealed that DeNitto was abusing her.
In the affidavit, Navarrete relates how a month earlier, Adel told her that "her husband was physically abusive and that her security detail had seen her bruises." According to Navarrete, Adel also told her that "her husband was following her in the house, which required her to get into a closet in order to continue our conversation." Navarrete added that "Ms. Adel's husband could be heard in the background."
The bar denied a public records request for its investigation of Adel, copies of which were provided to New Times by a third party. While the State Bar has not confirmed their authenticity, New Times was able to verify several details in the investigation through other sources.
Adel died of organ failure on April 30, 2022, a little more than a month after leaving office. Roughly 20 months later, DeNitto snapped in a drunken rage, murdering his girlfriend and her mother before turning a semiautomatic rifle on himself. His violent demise led several county attorney’s office staffers to reappraise their memories of Adel, including hints that she was being abused.
Navarrete’s affidavit aligns with suspicions about her possible abuse held by friends and former colleagues. It is not clear what, if anything, Navarrete or the State Bar did with the information about Adel’s alleged mistreatment. Navarrete did not respond to several requests for comment from New Times. State Bar spokesperson Taylor Tasler did not answer questions about whether the state bar acted on information that Adel was being abused.
In an email, Tasler wrote that while “the State Bar had several open charges on Ms. Adel at the time she passed,” those files are public only for six months following the date of dismissal. “Thereafter,” Tasler wrote, “the matter becomes confidential.”
"As a general matter however,” Tasler added in a follow-up email, “the State Bar would never use the fact that someone is a victim of domestic violence to take an adverse action against them."
The State Bar did take adverse action against Adel, though nothing suggests they used her alleged abuse as a cudgel to do so.
Adel's nearly 30-month tenure as county attorney was marred by her public battles with anxiety, alcohol abuse and an eating disorder. Adel spent 19 days in rehab facilities in Wickenburg and Malibu and later confessed to relapsing.
On the same February 2022 day that Adel told Navarrete that she was hiding from her husband, five division chiefs at the county attorney's office sent Adel a letter calling for her resignation and citing her issues with alcohol, forgetfulness and absences from the office. (None of them claimed to have witnessed Adel drinking at work.) The division chiefs forwarded the letter to the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors and the State Bar of Arizona, which began investigating Adel. The letter was also leaked to the press.
Adel fired back with a letter to the division chiefs, vowing to stay in office. But a month later, Adel announced her resignation, and the State Bar helped change her tune.
According to Rudy Dominguez, a former Phoenix police officer who served on Adel's security detail, Adel told him the bar was the reason she was resigning, noting that the bar would allow her to keep her law license if she left office. Dominguez said that when he asked her why she didn't fight the bar, Adel told him it wasn't possible.
"'If they don't like you and you go against them, they take your certification away,” Dominguez said Adel told him. “They can do that. They just do whatever they want."
In an email to county attorney’s office staffers on the day of Adel’s resignation, the attorney leading the bar's investigation wrote that "the information that was developed in our investigation largely influenced today's actions and was part of the SBA's negotiations with her." The attorney also wrote that other investigations into Adel's conduct would continue.
On May 6 of that year, the investigator sent a follow-up email to county attorney staffers. That the bar was dismissing and closing Adel's case "due to Ms. Adel's recent death” the week before.
Allister Adel and her husband, David DeNitto, embrace after Adel was sworn in as Maricopa County Attorney in 2019.
Allister Adel Campaign Facebook Page
Other investigation details revealed
The State Bar’s investigation included several other sworn affidavits from county attorney’s office employees, including from current Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell.Ryan Green, one of the division chiefs who signed the letter asking Adel to resign, confirmed to New Times that he had submitted an affidavit to the bar as part of its investigation. He also confirmed one of the details in it: that he attended an intervention for Adel. A friend of Adel's family, who asked to remain anonymous, told New Times that the intervention was organized by DeNitto.
Green said he had not heard about Adel hiding in a closet from her husband. He said he and Adel were “friendly” but more colleagues than friends. He did not think it was odd that he was invited to Adel’s intervention. “I knew what the reason was for my presence," Green said before ending the conversation.
Jennifer Liewer, then the communications director for the county attorney's office, drove Adel to a rehab facility in Wickenburg after the intervention, according to an affidavit Liewer provided to the State Bar. Liewer resigned in February 2022, stating in her resignation letter that she could no longer defend her boss' "sobriety and leadership." In her affidavit, Liewer wrote that she told Adel she should step down and was subsequently locked out of the office and told to work from home until her last day.
Liewer's affidavit does not mention any suspicions that Adel was abused by her husband. Liewer declined to comment when contacted by New Times.
An affidavit from Tom Liddy, chief of the county attorney's civil division, stated that Adel "sometimes displayed signs of impairment” during phone conversations, including "an inability to remember recent conversations or discussions," resulting in "ongoing circular discussions." The affidavit described Adel's anxiety as being so intense that she didn't want to talk to other elected county officials. However, Liddy was careful not to attribute Adel's odd behavior to alcohol addiction.
"I do not know the cause of Ms. Adel's impairment,” he wrote. “I have never observed her slur her speech or smelled alcohol on her breath.”
Liddy's affidavit also contained hints at discord between Adel and DeNitto. According to Liddy, Adel approached him in January 2022 to ask his office to send a letter to DeNitto accusing him of violating "marital privilege," a legal rule that protects private communications between spouses from being used in judicial proceedings.
"Ms. Adel explained that she was 'trying to scare the crap out of him' for violating the marital privilege," Liddy’s affidavit stated. Per his affidavit, Liddy told Adel that his division could not interfere in such a private matter.
When contacted by New Times, Liddy confirmed that he had submitted an affidavit to the state bar, though he declined to comment further.
Mitchell's affidavit said a June 2021 phone call with Adel was the first time that Mitchell noticed signs of Adel’s "repeating and unfocused conversation as well as memory issues." Mitchell wrote that she suspected substance abuse, though she dismissed those concerns at the time due to a head injury Adel suffered in 2020. Some close to Adel now suspect DeNitto caused that injury, which required emergency surgery.
Mitchell wrote that she also suspected Adel of being "intoxicated" during telephonic meetings and suggested that Adel "demonstrated signs of impairment" during an October 2020 debate with Democrat Julie Gunnigle. Mitchell’s affidavit also includes an unverified rumor that Adel “consumed approximately 13 bottles of wine” the weekend before she entered rehab in August 2021. Liewer's affidavit stated that the source of that rumor was DeNitto, who was allegedly abusing Adel at the time.
Mitchell's affidavit did not indicate that she was aware of Adel’s alleged abuse. (Nor does Liewer's, Green's or Liddy's.) Mitchell has refused to answer questions about Adel's possible spousal abuse. The county attorney's office has not responded to a request for a comment on the bar's investigation and the contents of Navarrete’s affidavit.
While Adel hid signs of her alleged abuse from many at the county attorney’s office, not everyone was completely in the dark. Dominguez previously told New Times that members of Adel’s security detail informed their supervisor, Tom Van Dorn, that they’d noticed bruises on Adel’s arms and suspected abuse. Van Dorn declined to comment on Dominguez's statement. Dominguez added that the security team lacked enough information to intervene at the time.
Dominguez said he was unaware of the incident Navarrete described of Adel hiding in a closet from DeNitto, or if anyone reported suspicions about Adel’s alleged abuse to law enforcement. He wouldn't be surprised if nobody did. The atmosphere at the county attorney’s office discouraged jumping the chain of command, he said.
"This goes to show how people know stuff, but they don't say things. They get afraid of repercussions,” he said of the revelation concerning Adel hiding in a closet. “They're afraid of getting in trouble from doing the right thing.”
