When Lake County District Attorney Paul Charas announced his resignation last month, he cited his chronically underfunded office as the reason, saying his tiny budget had made it impossible to do his job ethically.
But he may have had another reason. For months, elected officials, law enforcement officers and concerned members of the public had privately lobbied Charas to step down from his role or face a recall, according to interviews and documents obtained by OPB.
FILE - Lakeview's "Tall Man" greets visitors to the town on Dec. 11, 2025.
Saskia Hatvany / OPB
Critics said Charas was often too slow to prosecute cases in Lake County, even failing to charge people at all in some instances. In a letter dated Feb. 11, multiple Lake County officials also said he failed to attend interagency meetings and did not support the local drug treatment court. They urged him to resign, according to a copy of the letter obtained by OPB.
“Over the past five months, since we first raised these concerns with you in September 2025, we have seen no meaningful improvement,” the letter reads. “We respect you personally, but we must prioritize the safety, rights and confidence of Lake County residents.”
Concern about cases
It appears the bulk of leadership in Lake County had turned against Charas in recent months. The letter was signed by all of the Lake County Commissioners, Sheriff Daniel Tague, Undersheriff Mike Patterson and Director Jake Greer of Lake County Community Justice, among others.
Tague told OPB that his office had to convince Charas on multiple occasions to hand over more sensitive cases to the Oregon Department of Justice for prosecution.
“You’re talking everything from sex abuse cases to drug cases to domestic cases,” Tague said. “It’s just a huge variety.”
Charas said in a phone interview Sunday he disagreed with the allegations laid out in the letter, and that it did not significantly influence his decision to step down.
“I think there are some decisions that weren’t popular that I made on some specific cases,” Charas said. “At the end of the day, it’s very much the budget.”
Multiple people described how Charas allegedly failed to properly subpoena witnesses for upcoming trials. Charas said there was one example where an out-of-state witness disappeared before a trial was set to begin.
He also said claims that he regularly failed to attend multi-disciplinary team meetings were false. He said he missed one meeting due to a doctor’s appointment.
Another signee of the letter was Lakeview resident Lesa Cahill, who told OPB she was the victim of a burglary case. She declined to offer details about her case, but said it had made little progress in two years and she had grown frustrated with Charas.
“All I would really like is for the DA to do their job,” Cahill said.
In previous interviews, Charas acknowledged that he wasn’t able to prosecute every case to the fullest extent possible. Charas is the county’s only prosecutor, and he said his resources and time are often stretched razor thin.
“It comes to a point when you have to pick and choose where to focus on,” Charas said in April. “I try and prosecute everything. It’s just some of them you kind of have to move along and maybe not get everything you want out of it.”
Related: ‘It’s untenable’: Lake County district attorney suddenly resigns, cites lack of funding
Charas has had a relatively short legal career. His LinkedIn page shows he graduated from Willamette University in 2018. His longest stint since then was three years with the Clatsop County District Attorney’s Office, where he worked in the mental health treatment court. He was still living in Astoria when he won the election as Lake County’s new district attorney in 2024.
Critics say Charas should have known the conditions and budget of the office when he ran for office. The district attorney’s office had a total expense budget of just over $200,000 this fiscal year.
Charas, Tague and other leaders have pointed out that 80% of Lake County is public land that cannot be taxed. And with only 8,000 residents for a county the size of New Jersey, all agencies struggle with a lack of revenue, they said.
Still, within the past two months, a group of citizens had organized a recall committee to ask the voters for the removal of Charas.
Steve Yates, a retired Oregon State Police sergeant, was the chief petitioner in the effort. Having worked in Lakeview for 14 years, he still regularly follows cases in the county. Yates said he noticed multiple examples of serious charges being dismissed or ending with minor punishments.
“I started asking some questions around and learned that Mr. Charas just didn’t seem to be very effective at doing his job,” Yates said.
Yates said the committee, composed of concerned citizens, had begun the process of filing a recall. Charas announced his resignation before the recall was officially filed with the Oregon Secretary of State.
Recalls of district attorneys in Lake County are not unusual. There have been two other similar attempts against former prosecutors in recent years: David Schutt in 2012 and Sharon Forster in 2018.
Charas said he has actually filed more cases and had fewer dismissals that some of his predecessors. OPB was unable to verify the claim.
Tague acknowledged that the budget will likely continue to be an issue for whoever takes over the job.
FILE - The town of Lakeview, Ore., is seen from above on Dec. 9, 2025. The Eastern Oregon town has a population of 2,400.
Saskia Hatvany / OPB
“Money’s not everything, but it’s sure a big contributing factor,” he said. “We’ve got to fix the underlying issue.”
The turmoil around the district attorney is another blow to a region that’s been struggling.
A report that OPB released last month showed how Lakeview, the county seat with a population of 2,000 people, is on the brink of insolvency after a string of bad luck, poor investments and mismanagement that the state has investigated for possible criminal activity.
The state dropped an investigation into former town manager Michele Parry without filing charges. And Charas told OPB at the time that his office was too cash-strapped to take it on.
The bankruptcy of a natural gas pipeline that bisected Lake County has also decimated local tax revenue, and there have been deep cuts to public services such as policing and 911 dispatch.
Charas has said he will remain in office until Aug. 4.
Related: A small Oregon town faces financial peril. Can residents save Lakeview?
