The state’s judicial branch is covering up the misconduct of judges and Attorney General Phil Weiser, who is running for governor, was complicit in the coverup, the former executive director of the Colorado Commission on Judicial Discipline is alleging in an exclusive interview with The Center Square.
And the former official is protesting against the alleged misconduct with a recent petition that he filed against Weiser in Boulder County Court in Longmont. The petition requested a civil protection order, with the filing alleging concerns over a potential $2.66 million to $2.75 million “hush money contract” and first-degree misconduct.
Christopher Gregory, the “declarant” in the case, is a former member, vice chair, chair and executive director of the Colorado Commission on Judicial Discipline. The commission investigates and prosecutes unethical conduct involving state judges.
Gregory discussed his court filing with The Center Square and provided access to 39 pages of court documents. Gregory is accusing Weiser and others in his department of concealing the misconduct, which Gregory contended involves the hush money contract to a fired chief of staff in the state judicial administrator’s office. Gregory shared an email to Boulder County District Attorney Michael Dougherty, in which Gregory described the contract as a $2.66 million to $2.75 million bribe for the fired official’s silence. Gregory sees the contract as an effort to cover up judicial misconduct.
Lawrence Pacheco, the attorney general office’s communications director, told The Center Square that the office has “no comment on this active case.”
Gregory said when he attempted to investigate the misconduct in question – the “hush money contract” – he was fired from his position of executive director.
The court document filed by Gregory requests a civil protection order against Weiser. The order is intended to stop alleged harassment, retaliation, intimidation or related conduct.
In his petition, Gregory expressed concern about judicial officials.
In 2023, former Colorado Supreme Court Chief Justice Nathan Coats was publicly censured due to his admission of failing to adequately perform judicial and administrative duties “competently and diligently” under Colorado’s code of judicial conduct.
The allegation of Coats’ failure to perform judicial and administrative duties came when he allowed the state judicial branch to award a leadership training contract to Mindy Masias, the former chief of staff for the Colorado State Court Administrator’s Office.
Masias was fired in early 2019 for alleged “financial irregularities,” according to previous news coverage.
After she left the court administrator’s office, she was reportedly awarded a $2.66 million to $2.75 million contract for leadership training, but it was later rescinded. No payment was made to her after the contract received significant media attention and criticism.
Christopher Ryan, the state’s chief court administrator who resigned in July 2019, alleged Masias was awarded the contract in exchange for not filing a tell-all sexual discrimination lawsuit.
Gregory has described the contract as a $2.66 million to $2.75 million bribe to get her to drop the lawsuit and be silent about the alleged sexual discrimination. As such, Gregory sees the contract as a cover-up of judicial misconduct.
And Ryan Eric Brown, the state’s then-human resources chief, outlined at least 20 alleged episodes of misconduct from state judges and other state officials, according to an investigation by the Denver Gazette. Brown also said the contract may have been awarded to Masias to prevent her from exposing the misconduct.
But in April 2019, Coats signed off on the contract to ensure the misconduct allegations were not made public, according to Brown.
Coats resigned in late 2020 after admitting he failed to perform his judicial duties.
The Denver Gazette investigation later found that Coats didn’t sign the contract to silence Masias nor was it quid-pro-quo. Instead, the investigation concluded that Coats signed the deal to keep a valuable and experienced employee on the state’s payroll.
The Center Square reached out to the State Court Administrator’s Office. Suzanne Karrer, the chief communications officer, said the matters raised by Gregory have “thoroughly reviewed through five outside investigations, three of which resulted in publicly available reports. None of these investigations substantiated the allegations Mr. Gregory continues to repeat. These issues have been fully addressed.”
Karrer sent The Center Square the reports.
The first investigation was conducted by State Auditor Kerri Hunter and, according to the reports, found evidence of possible financial misconduct. The second one was done by an outside law group, Investigations Law Group, LLC (ILG), led by Elizabeth Rita, an attorney, and Anne McCord, the workplace investigations specialist. They reported deficiencies in accountability and workplace procedures. The final investigation was conducted by Robert Troyer, a Colorado attorney, and Nicholas Mitchell, the former independent monitor who reviewed Denver agencies such as law enforcement.
The Troyer-Mitchell investigation concluded that the contract for Masias was not awarded to cover up misconduct allegations, but reported finding serious administrative failures, misconduct or poor judgment.
The debate didn’t end with the cancellation of Masias’ contract because Gregory still had questions about whether it had been properly authorized in the first place or whether it had a legitimate public purpose. Another concern Gregory expressed was whether judicial officials had adequately disclosed what happened.
For his recent court filing, Gregory relied on an executive summary produced by the then-State Auditor Dianne Ray, which was released in December 2020.
Gregory also accused Weiser of participating in the alleged concealment of information concerning the Masias agreement.
Gregory further filed a notice of related cases on Oct. 5 of this year, which named Dougherty, the Boulder County district attorney, for his role in allegedly covering up the misconduct in question.
In that filing, Gregory requests relief in the form of requesting Dougherty to compel criminal prosecution.
In exclusive material obtained by The Center Square from Gregory, he shared a communication chain with Dougherty’s office.
The email chain names Weiser, First Assistant Attorney General LeeAnn Morrill and former Assistant Solicitor General Grant Sullivan among the state officials accused of concealing the judicial misconduct. The accusations are from Gregory.
Gregory’s allegations have generated multiple court proceedings, but the documents provided to The Center Square do not establish that anyone has been criminally charged over the Masias contract or that a court has substantiated Gregory’s broader conspiracy allegations.
The Colorado Commission on Judicial Discipline, through Senior Assistant Attorney General Charles Kooyman, filed two subsequent motions on Oct. 7 to intervene in Gregory’s case against Dougherty.
These motions, however, do not say that Weiser directed the commission to intervene in the case.
This was the state’s direct attempt to seek permission from the court to intervene for the limited purpose of protecting confidential judicial information, as well as asking the court to seal Gregory’s declaration and require future filings containing judicial discipline information to be made entirely confidential.
The commission argued that the Colorado Constitution, through Article VI, Section 23, protects the confidentiality of judicial-discipline proceedings before formal proceedings commence.
Gregory argued that the confidential information in question adequately supports allegations of misconduct and should receive public scrutiny, since these state officials are paid by taxpayers. But the commission rejected this argument.
The motions filed against Gregory have not been granted or denied as of Tuesday.
History behind the allegations
Gregory contacted Boulder County in October 2025 and reported the suspected crimes to the Longmont Police Department. The department then said it referred the case to the Colorado Bureau of Investigation.
However, Special Agent Tangeman from CBI told Gregory that the bureau would decline to investigate, according to another communication chain that Gregory provided exclusively to The Center Square.
The Center Square reached out to CBI for comment, but did not hear back.
The Longmont Police Department told The Center Square that it had no further comments.
The Center Square reached out to the District Attorney’s Office to confirm that Gregory contacted the office and that the county communicated with the Longmont Police Detective Todd Chambers.
Elizabeth Scanlon, an administrative assistant and paralegal for the Boulder County District Attorney’s Office, confirmed in an email that the county did receive communication and documents from Gregory.
The office communicated with Chambers and found the “evidence of a crime committed in Boulder County was insufficient,” Scanlon told The Center Square.
One exchange includes a Nov. 19, 2025 response from Assistant District Attorney Kenneth Kupfner after Chambers reported referring Gregory to the Colorado Bureau of Investigation. Kupfner wrote in an email, “Better to refer him to CBI than me! Nice work!”
Kupfner told The Center Square Tuesday that he sent that email.
Scanlon said the office’s prosecutorial duties “go beyond adopting conclusions reached by other entities or individuals,” and that was a factor in deciding whether to prosecute the case.
“We carefully scrutinize any evidence presented to our office to determine if it is wholly accurate and has been obtained through ethical means,” Scanlon said. “If so, we must then undertake the important analysis of whether there is sufficient evidence to meet our ethical responsibilities as prosecutors.”
Gregory also provided The Center Square with exclusive access to the email chain in which he contacted the police department.
