Bath city councilor to challenge veteran district attorney in four-county midcoast race
David Sinclair
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Posted March 17, 2014, at 11:52 a.m.
BATH, Maine — A Bath city councilor has filed papers to seek the district attorney post held for 21 years by Republican Geoffrey Rushlau, who has not faced a re-election challenger in eight years.
David Sinclair filed his papers last week to run in prosecutorial District 6, which covers Knox, Waldo, Lincoln and Sagadahoc counties.
Sinclair, a Democrat, will be completing his second consecutive three-year term on the Bath City Council at the end of this year.
Sinclair has run a private law practice in Bath for four years. He said he returned to law school after 16 years of running a software development company and being a computer consultant. He has a law degree from the University of Maine School of Law in Portland.
Rushlau has announced he will seek another term.
Rushlau, a Dresden resident, is one of the state’s most veteran prosecutors, having been appointed to the district attorney post in June 1993 by then-Gov. John McKernan, when William Anderson was appointed to a judicial post. Rushlau has since been elected to the post in 1994, 1998, 2002, 2006 and 2010.
Rushlau had previously served as an assistant district attorney in Androscoggin County and then Sagadahoc County beginning in 1981.
Sinclair said he wants to focus on better outcomes and to reduce recidivism. He said programs such as the Restorative Justice Project of the Midcoast are important. The state is spending a lot of money to keep people in jail and a lot of money on mental health services for people in jail, he said.
District attorneys in Maine are elected to four-year terms.
No other candidates have filed papers for the prosecutorial seat. Candidates not enrolled in either party have until June 2 to file nomination papers with the Maine secretary of state.
The party primaries are scheduled for June 10, and the general election is Nov. 4.
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