A candidate for a spot on Gwinnett’s Superior Court bench is on leave from his current job as a local prosecutor, with his resignation scheduled to take effect next month.
The pending resignation of Jason Park “had to do with some issues involving the handling of cases,” Gwinnett County District Attorney Danny Porter told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution on Monday. Porter declined to offer further insight, calling it “an internal personnel matter.”
Park — who submitted his resignation on May 11 and is on paid administrative leave until its goes into effect on June 8 — is one of five candidates vying for the Superior Court spot vacated by retiring Judge Tom Davis. Tuesday is Election Day.
In a Saturday night post on his Facebook page, Park called previous media reports regarding his resignation the product of “last-minute, desperate attempts by my political opponents to drive false attacks and accusations against me.” Asked for comment on Monday, Park sent the same message to The AJC via email.
He provided few specifics, but did confirm that he is on leave from the DA’s office pending his resignation’s effective date — “but not because of the false claims made by an opponent in the media,” he wrote.
“As a career prosecutor,” Park wrote, “I have done the right thing even when it’s hard.”
The other candidates in Tuesday's race include local attorneys John R. Burdges, Veronica Cope and Tracey Mason, as well as Jon Setzer, a fellow Gwinnett County prosecutor.
Local judicial races are nonpartisan and do not involve party primaries. A runoff election, though, would be held July 24 if one of the five candidates does not receive at least 50 percent of the vote.
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