About Attorney John Rodabaugh

After graduating from Michigan State University with training in history and natural sciences, i.e. Calculus, Physics & Chemistry, John spent several years working in human services with person with severe mental illness and developmental disabilities.

His advocacy for his clients led him to the law, and John attended Thomas M Cooley Law School graduating Cum Laude and serving on the School’s Law Review. While attending law school he clerked for a law firm in Grand Ledge, Michigan and served as an Assistant City Prosecutor, trying his first jury trials before graduating from law school.

After Law School, he headed to the Pacific Northwest and worked in the city of Walla Walla, (the town so nice, they named it twice), for a firm serving as both Post Appellate Counsel to inmates at the nearby Washington State Penitentiary and as a Public Defense Attorney for the city of Walla Walla. In the City of Walla Walla, John systematically challenged several obsolete City Laws, winning hundreds of public defense cases on legal and procedural challenges.

Several years later, he ended up across the state in Snohomish County, just north of Seattle, where he opened his own firm providing two opposite types of services. John served as the City Prosecutor for several smaller cities over the years and at the same time practiced criminal defense, in other jurisdictions.

During his time in Washington, John tried hundreds of misdemeanors and felony jury trials including DUI, Assault, Theft, Shoplifting, Domestic Violence Crimes, Burglary, Protection Order Violations, Drug crimes and Sex Offenses both as a prosecutor and a defense attorney.

John has tried both bench and jury trials in Municipal, District and Superior Courts, and has litigated in the Washington Court of Appeals.

The Covid Pandemic shut the Courts of Washington for an extended time forcing the closure of John’s practice. John went to work for the Seattle City Attorney’s Office as an Assistant City Prosecutor, there he was a member of the Trial Team handling complex drug related DUI cases and mentoring newer attorneys.

He came to Arizona in 2022 to become the City Prosecutor in Flagstaff and to watch his daughter, a division 1 Basketball player compete for Northern Arizona University. After leaving Flagstaff due to controversy over his reforms of the Flagstaff Municipal Court to provide meaningful diversion opportunities and treatment centered prosecution for those dealing with substance abuse and mental illness, John gone back to the beginning, and to his roots in criminal defense.

John believes addressing the root causes of behavior for justice involved individuals keeps everyone in the community safe. John has experience with Mental Health Courts, Veteran’s Court, Diversion, Deferred Prosecution and other alternatives to conviction and incarceration.

John is very excited to use his over 30 years of experience to concentrate on helping his clients, find their way in an overly complex court system that is more about “process” than “due process”. John is committed to provide the very best defense.