FLORENCE, Ariz. — The Pinal County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously Friday to authorize a State Bar complaint against County Attorney Brad Miller, and then declined to say what the complaint will allege.
The 5-0 vote, taken in a special meeting, tells the board’s outside lawyers to file with the State Bar of Arizona. The bar can investigate if it sees reason to believe a lawyer broke professional rules. Punishment, if any, belongs to the Arizona Supreme Court. Complaints stay confidential unless the bar opens a public discipline case.
Chairman Jeffrey McClure told the meeting that confidentiality is there to protect the lawyer being accused, and that supervisors should let the process run under Supreme Court rules. Vice Chairman Jeff Serdy, who joined remotely, said people were already asking why the board was doing this and whether anyone could comment. He said any sanction would be the court’s decision, not the board’s, and asked critics to wait.
James Daniels, a board spokesman, said he could not add detail. Miller’s office did not answer the Arizona Mirror’s request for comment. The board had met its lawyers in executive session on Sept. 30. That agenda said supervisors wanted advice on Miller’s ethical duties to the board, the scope of his representation, and bar rules, in light of his statements and actions toward the supervisors as a group and as individuals.
The relationship has been hostile since Miller took office in January 2025, which is why outsiders cannot tell which fight produced the complaint. In February the board sent Mayes’ office allegations that Miller misspent public money and destroyed records after he hired two employees without board approval and left them unpaid for weeks. In April supervisors declared a conflict, saying the way he runs the office’s law-enforcement work clashes with his duties to the board.
The loudest dispute is immigration. In August 2025 Miller signed his 10 investigators — the staff who interview victims and witnesses — onto a 287(g) agreement with Homeland Security without telling the board. Supervisors ordered him to end it, arguing only the board can make a federal partnership. The sheriff’s office has had its own 287(g) deal since 2008; the board renewed that one in the same stretch of meetings in which it censured Miller. He refused to drop his agreement. In May a Maricopa County Superior Court judge ruled that he had acted unlawfully.
Friday’s vote does not remove Miller from office. It opens a confidential professional-conduct file and leaves the public waiting on the bar.