Exhibit A

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DECLARATION OF VAUGHN R WALKER

I, Vaughn R Walker, declare as follows:

1. I am an attorney admitted to practice before the Supreme Court of the United States and 

all courts in California and various federal courts in the United States. In 2011, I retired 

as a United States District Judge for the Northern District of California, having served on 

that court from 1990 and as Chief Judge of that court from 2004 through year-end 2010.

2. During my twenty plus years as a federal judge, I presided over thousands of cases and 

hundreds of trials involving disputes under United States federal law and the laws of 

several states, predominantly California. I also sat by designation as an appellate judge 

with the United States Courts of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and the Federal Circuit. 

From 2006 to 2011, I served on the Civil Rules Advisory Committee of the Judicial 

Conference of the United States. 

3. Prior to serving as a judge, I practiced law in San Francisco from 1972 to 1990. My 

practice principally involved complex civil litigation, including securities, antitrust, 

environmental, land use and sports law.

4. Since retiring from the federal court, I have served as a mediator and arbitrator in private 

law practice in San Francisco and elsewhere. I have also taught courses in law as an 

adjunct instructor at the University of California Berkeley School of Law, Stanford 

University School of Law and, most recently at the University of California Hastings

College of Law in San Francisco. In 2014 and 2015, I co-taught an Introduction to 

American Law course with Geoffrey Hazard at Hastings that, among other topics,

touched upon the rules of professional conduct and ethics for judges and lawyers in the 

United States. 

5. I am familiar with 28 USC §455 governing judicial recusal in the federal courts and have a 

working knowledge of analogous provisions of state law, in particular such law in 

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California. I am also familiar with the principles which govern disqualification of 

arbitrators and mediators in private dispute resolution. 

6. My office address is 4 Embarcadero Center, Suite 2200, San Francisco, California 94111, 

United States of America.

7. I have been retained by the defendants in the above matter to render an opinion 

whether the court in the above-entitled proceeding is under a duty to recuse or whether 

the court in the appropriate exercise of its discretion should recuse. I formed the opinion 

that the commands of the statute governing recusal of United States judges warrants 

recusal because under certain provisions recusal is required and, even if not required, 

recusal is warranted as a matter of appropriate judicial discretion. 

8. In forming this opinion, I have reviewed the following materials:

a. Superseding Indictment (“SI”) (Doc 1);

b. Defendants’ Motion for Recusal (Doc 1059), and the exhibits attached thereto;

c. United States’ Response to Defendants’ Motion for Recusal (Doc 1067);

d. Human Trafficking: Arizona’s Not Buying It, a publication of the Office of Attorney 

General of Arizona, https://www.azag.gov/sites/default/files/publications/2018-

06/Human_Trafficking_Not_Buying_It.pdf;

e. Arizona Attorney General’s Office Combatting Human Trafficking, 

https://www.azag.gov/criminal/trafficking

f. A letter dated August 16, 2017 signed by the court’s husband to the chairs and 

ranking members of the Senate and House communications and technology 

committees urging Congress to enact amendments to the Communications 

Decency Act of 1996 to affirm the authority of state attorneys general and others 

to prosecute the website Backpage.com and persons associated with it; and

g. Webinar offerings by the Arizona Attorney General’s Office, including titles such as 

“Human Trafficking for Parents” and “Student Presentations: Human Trafficking –

Grades 7-12” https://www.azag.gov/outreach/webinars. 

9. In my opinion, the court has a duty under 28 USC §455 to recuse. The reasons for this 

opinion are:

a. This case relates to the defendants’ alleged involvement in the Backpage.com web

site;

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b. The SI herein makes 661 specific references to Backpage;

c. All of the defendants are referred to in the SI as “BACKPAGE DEFENDANTS,” a 

defined term in the SI in ¶8 at 3;

d. According to the SI, the BACKPAGE DEFENDANTS allegedly intended to facilitate 

prostitution through advertisements on the Backpage website, SI ¶9 at 3;

e. The SI uses the terms “prostitution” and related terminology and “trafficking” 

interchangeably, see, e g, SI at ¶13 at4 (“pimps trafficking children”); ¶14 at 5; ¶74 

at 17; ¶100 at 23; ¶111 at 26; ¶131 at 30; ¶136 at 33; ¶ 144 at 36; ¶151 at 37; ¶160 

at 40; ¶168 at 42;

f. A letter described in the SI refers to Backpage as a “’hub for’ human trafficking” 

and goes on to state that “forensic training” is not required to understand that 

Backpage advertisements “are advertisements for prostitutions,” SI ¶111 at 26; 

g. The SI alleges: “Many of the ads published on Backpage depicted children who

were victims of sex trafficking,” SI ¶13 at 4; 

h. The Attorney General’s publication identified in ¶8.a., above, specifically mentions 

Backpage as fostering and facilitating human trafficking, including trafficking in 

underage sex; and

i. All defendants are charged in the SI with violation of 18 USC §1952(a)(3)(A), travel 

to facilitate prostitution, among other offenses arising out of prostitution-related 

activities.

10. Recusal is mandatory in the following situations:

a. The judge’s “impartiality might reasonably be questioned,” 28 USC §455(a);

b. The judge knows that her spouse has “an interest that could be substantially 

affected by the outcome of the proceeding,” 28 USC §455(b)(4); and

c. The judge’s spouse has “an interest that could be substantially affected by the 

outcome of the proceeding,” 28 USC §455(b)(5)(iii).

11. Each of the foregoing grounds for recusal apply in this case and each such ground 

individually warrants recusal. The facts relevant to my opinion do not appear to be 

disputed, except with respect to the timeliness of the defendants’ filing their motion for 

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recusal. With respect to the facts of timeliness, I am unable to offer an opinion. As set 

forth below, I can assume that the defendants were untimely in seeking recusal and 

opine whether that untimeliness should affect the court’s decision to recuse. 

12. Of the three grounds for recusal set forth ¶10, above, the relevant facts do not neatly fit 

under each ground. To a degree, they overlap and apply to more than one of the 

grounds for recusal. This makes the basis for recusal compelling. Suffice to say, that if 

any one of these three statutory grounds for recusal is met, recusal is required. 

13. When the circumstances described in §455(b) (4) or (5) are present, recusal is required as 

a matter of express statutory command and not subject to judicial discretion. 

Application of the more nuanced recusal provisions of §455(a) are reviewed for abuse of 

discretion. Section 455(a) was enacted in 1974 and displaced the court’s duty to sit in a 

case except upon a showing of bias or prejudice. See 28 USC §144. Under §455(a) 

recusal is required where a “reasonable person with knowledge of all the facts would 

conclude that the judge’s impartiality might reasonably be questioned.” United States v 

Studley, 783 F 2d 934,939 (9 Cir 1986). Proof of actual bias or prejudice is not, however,

required for recusal under §455(a). 

14. Impartiality being a core attribute of the judiciary, judges are reluctant to find grounds 

for recusal under §455(a), because of the implication that the judge lacks an essential 

component of what it means to act as a judge. Context, however, is crucial. Recusal 

under §455(a) in one case in no way suggests deficiency in the qualifications to act as a 

judge in other cases. Indeed, recusal under §455(a) more likely reflects the judge’s

accurate perception of how judges are perceived by the relevant observers. 

15. The standard under §455(a) is not, however, the judge’s state of mind about the case. 

Instead, what matters is the standard of the “reasonable person with knowledge of all 

the facts.” And the “reasonable person” in this context is not necessarily an omniscient 

or entirely detached individual. The reasonable person is one “with knowledge of all the 

facts” and knowledge requires understanding or appreciation of the facts. Thus, the 

reasonable person for the recusal motion directed to the late Judge Stephen Reinhardt in 

Perry v Schwarzeneger, 630 F 3d 909 (9 Cir 2011), a case upon which the government 

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places considerable reliance, is a person familiar with the role of an appellate judge, the 

appeals process and involvement of public interest groups seeking to vindicate or oppose 

a voter initiative. By contrast, this case involves a criminal proceeding whose facts would 

be decided by lay jurors untrained and inexperienced in law or the judicial process and 

who likely would be exposed to the actions of the Attorney General directed at 

Backpage.com with which the defendants were allegedly involved. The reasonable 

person here is not the reasonable person of the Perry context.1 

16. The reasonable person here could be expected to appreciate that both the court and the 

Arizona Attorney General hold public office, discharge duties to the public generally and 

are charged to protect the public interest in the fair and impartial administration of 

justice. The fact that the court administers justice under federal law and the Arizona 

Attorney General does so at the state level would for the reasonable person here appear 

to be an immaterial difference. The reasonable person in this context would more likely 

be sensitive to fundamental considerations of fairness than to principles of federalism. 

17. In the situation at bar, the appearance of partiality does not arise from the court’s 

actions in the conduct of these proceedings. An appearance that a trial judge’s rulings or 

demeanor favors one side or the other is routinely cured by appropriate curative 

instructions. Instead, in this case the appearance of partiality would stem from 

extrajudicial facts and circumstances. This presents a compelling ground for recusal as 

opposed to a situation in which the court’s rulings or demeanor in court is cited as a basis 

for recusal. Cf: In re Medtronic, Inc., Sprint Fidelis Leads Products Liability Litigation, 623 

F 3d 1200, 1209 (8 Cir 2010). 

1 At any rate, the vitality of Perry decision on recusal is doubtful as the Ninth Circuit lacked jurisdiction 

in that case and its judgment was vacated. Hollingsworth v Perry, 520 US 693 (2013). Because I was 

the trial judge in the Perry case, I am familiar with its history. No recusal motion was brought against 

me in that case although after losing and after I retired from the bench, the proponents of the voter 

initiative sought to vacate that judgment on the ground that I failed to disclose my sexual orientation 

and a personal relationship. Another judge determined that disclosure was not warranted under 

those facts and declined to set aside the judgment. Perry v Schwarzeneger, 790 F Supp 2d 1119 (N D 

Cal 2011). 

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18. This also distinguishes the situation at bar from a situation in which the spouse of the 

court has taken a public position on a policy matter that is brought to court. That was 

obviously the situation with Judge Reinhardt and his spouse. Spouses may obviously 

differ in their political, policy, religious and social views. The view of one spouse may or 

may not reflect the views of the other. Even similar spousal views may not preclude a 

judge’s impartiality in a case where those views are tested in court. 

19. Judges frequently are called upon to decide cases involving issues on which they hold 

opinions, involving parties or attorneys whom they know or have had dealings with and 

involving matters of which they have studied or acquired knowledge or experience. 

These circumstances alone do not usually raise a question about the judge’s impartiality. 

But the government overreaches in arguing that because the Attorney General takes 

positions on a variety of matters that also find their way into federal court, the court 

would be disqualified from a broad range of cases if it acknowledges that her impartiality 

would be questioned in this case. 

20. The problem here stems not from the Attorney General’s enforcement of state laws 

against prostitution and sex trafficking. Instead, the problem is that in doing so Attorney 

General has expressly targeted an entity with which these defendants are identified. 

This makes it impossible to dissociate the views of the Attorney General from the issues 

in this case. Where those views are general and not specifically pointed as here, recusal 

might generally not be required. This situation differs. 

21. The Attorney General, the chief law enforcement official of the state in which this court 

sits, has in effect opined on the criminal liability of the website with which the SI alleges 

the defendants were involved. The Attorney General’s allegation of criminal lability of 

Backpage does not automatically translate to criminal liability of the defendants, but it 

sends a signal that the reasonable observer in this context is unlikely to miss. 

22. Because recusal under §455(a) is discretionary, a recusal decision does not depend on 

the court’s determination that it is, in fact, not impartial. A decision to recuse under this 

section does not amount to a confession of partiality. Rather, it is simply an appreciation 

that a reasonable person – in this case from the perspective of a lay juror – would likely 

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associate the court with the views of the Attorney General. Discretion and sensitivity to 

such considerations would seem especially warranted when, as here, the subject matter 

of the charges against the defendants touch highly charged issues, such as prostitution 

and sex trafficking. Whether same-sex couples should be accorded the right of civil 

marriage, the underlying issue in Perry, while controversial at the time, lacked the 

emotional content of the issues in this prosecution. Sensitivity to this circumstance is an 

appropriate component in the exercise of the court’s discretion under §455(a). 

23. Turning to the grounds identified under 28 USC §455(b), it is important to note that these 

grounds cannot be waived. 28 USC §455(e). An objective viewer of the public 

statements of the Arizona Attorney General and his office, cited above, would conclude 

that the court could not dissociate herself from the views of the Attorney General. First, 

those views relate directly to the Backpage website with which all defendants are 

allegedly associated. Second, the state laws that the Attorney General in his statements 

seeks to vindicate condemn essentially the same conduct that the federal laws under 

which defendants are charged also condemn. Hence, the Attorney General has, in 

essence, publicly expressed views on the outcome of the proceedings in this case. Third, 

as a public official charged with knowledge of and enforcement of the laws, the Attorney 

General has, in effect, expressed an interest in the outcome of these proceedings. 

24. The Attorney General is presumed to have knowledge of the facts on which his office 

undertakes official action. While, of course, in a large law enforcement agency, such as 

that of the Attorney General of Arizona, the Attorney General himself may not have 

actual personal knowledge of the facts on which every enforcement action is taken. The 

present situation appears to differ from the routine, however. It appears that the 

Attorney General’s office has commented on facts pertaining to Backpage. Second, the 

Attorney General has specifically undertaken action to route out sex trafficking and 

prostitution in Arizona. While almost certainly these measures enjoy widespread public 

support, the Attorney General’s singling out Backpage with which the defendants here 

are allegedly associated bespeaks “personal knowledge of disputed evidentiary facts” in 

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this proceeding. The Attorney General’s personal knowledge does not translate to the 

court’s knowledge, but it does connote an interest in the outcome of the proceedings. 

25. The Attorney General is an elected official of the State of Arizona whose continuance in 

office and influence on public policy depends upon maintenance of credibility in the 

realm of his responsibilities which centers on law enforcement. The Attorney General’s

interest in his reputation makes that interest subject to and directly affected by the 

successful prosecution of the defendants here, implicating the ground for recusal under 

28 USC §4555(b)(4). An acquittal of the defendants in this case would draw into question 

the campaign against internet-related sex trafficking and prostitution that the Attorney 

General has undertaken. Such a rebuke to an important policy endeavor of the Attorney 

General would affect his reputation in a way that is analogous to the impact on financial 

interests for which recusal is mandated under 28 USC §455(b)(4). To be sure, the 

Attorney General holds office in his own name and his successes or failures only 

derivatively affect the court, if at all. But the same is true in a situation in which the 

judicial spouse holds financial interests separate and apart from the judge. Recusal is 

nonetheless required in that situation. 

26. Given the notoriety of the Attorney General’s campaign against internet-related sex 

trafficking and prostitution, it is implausible that the court is unaware of the Attorney 

General’s endeavors in this regard. Furthermore, having taken the position that he has, 

it is impossible for the Attorney General to divest himself of the conflict his actions 

create for the court, divestment sometimes being a possible remedy when a spouse’s 

financial interest is minimal and only discovered after prolonged proceedings in a case. 

Here, by contrast, one must assume that the Attorney General’s views on internetrelated sex trafficking and prostitution are genuine expressions of his views on the best 

interests of Arizonans and not undertaken lightly or solely for political advancement. 

Nor can the Attorney General be expected to cast these views aside as one might divest 

ownership of securities. Whether the Attorney General’s sentiments are shared by the 

court, the adverse effect on the Attorney General’s reputation or standing that acquittal 

or dismissal of all or many of the charges in the present case would be palpable and 

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mandates recusal under 28 USC §455(4). Relatedly, therefore, it is inappropriate for the 

court to rule on substantive matters while the recusal motion remains pending. 

27. Closely related to the grounds for recusal under 28 USC §455(b)(4), recusal under 28 USC 

§455(b)(5)(iii) is required in this situation because of the interests of the Attorney 

General would be substantially and adversely affected by rulings of the court favorable 

to the defendants. The partiality that the Arizona Attorney General’s pronouncements 

betoken and the similarity of the Arizona laws that the Attorney General invokes and the 

laws under which the defendants here are charged demonstrate that the Attorney 

General’s reputation would suffer from rulings of this court favorable to the defendants. 

The substantial effect test under 28 USC §455(b)(5)(iii) is not limited to financial or 

monetary effects. The interest described in §455(b)(5)(iii) includes noneconomic as well 

as economic interests. Potashnick v Port City Const Co, 609 F 2d 1101, 1113 (5th Cir), cert 

denied, 449 US 820, 101 SCt 78, 66 LEd2d 22 (1980). These interests include the Attorney 

General’s prospects for re-election, political advancement and stature in the legal 

community. Recusal is required. 28 USC §455(e). 

28. Although the grounds for recusal described in ¶10, above, are separately applicable and 

each individually would require recusal, the facts here create a mosaic that makes

recusal unavoidable. The tension between the Attorney General’s prominent public 

campaign against internet-related sex trafficking and prostitution and the court’s 

obligation both to avoid the actuality and appearance of partiality and “to administer 

justice without respect to persons,” 28 USC §453, makes it necessary for the court to 

grant the motion for recusal.

29. Finally, the government argues that the defendants waited too long to bring their motion 

to recuse. A party’s right to seek recusal can sometimes be deemed waived by delay if 

the grounds for recusal are insubstantial, such as ownership of an insignificant financial 

interest, and the case has long proceeded before a recusal motion is submitted. Those 

circumstances do not apply here. Pursuing enforcement of Arizona laws against 

prostitution and sex trafficking is a major priority of the Attorney General. Furthermore, 

there are numerous other judges without any connection to these proceedings and who

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are fully able to preside in these proceedings. Waiver of recusal through untimeliness 

does not apply in these facts. 

Date: October 14, 2020

____________________________________

Vaughn R Walker

United States District Judge (Ret)

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