Pro-Trump attorney is third indicted in Michigan vote machine probe

• Stefanie Lambert Junttila is indicted by grand jury on allegations of breaking into vote machine tabulators
• ‘I know that I've done absolutely nothing illegal,’ she said recently on a conservative podcast
• No one else will be indicted in the case, special prosecutor says

LANSING — Stefanie Lambert Junttila, a pro-Trump attorney who challenged 2020 election results across the country, was charged Thursday with four felonies stemming from an alleged plot to illegally access Michigan voting machines.

Oakland County Circuit Court records show Lambert Junttila was set to be arraigned Thursday afternoon on four counts, including willfully damaging a voting machine, undue possession of a voting machine and conspiracy to commit unauthorized access of a computer. 

Lambert Junttila is the third suspect indicted by a grand jury in Special Prosecutor D.J. Hilson's probe of the alleged tabulator tampering scheme. Fellow attorney Matthew DePerno, the 2020 Republican nominee for attorney general, was charged Tuesday, along with former state Rep. Daire Rendon, R-Lake City. 

Related:

• ‘I have been indicted,’ says suspect in Michigan vote machine tampering probe
• Matthew DePerno, ex-Rep. Daire Rendon charged with vote machine tampering
• Former Michigan GOP co-chair pleads not guilty to false elector charges

No one else will be charged in the case, Hilson announced Thursday, including Barry County Sheriff Dar Leaf and other suspects publicly identified last fall by Democratic Attorney General Dana Nessel. 

The charges against Lambert Junttila, like those against DePerno and Rendon, are punishable by four or five years in prison. They stem from a state police investigation and were authorized by an “independent citizens grand jury," Hilson said in a statement. 

"Protecting the election process is of the utmost importance for our state and country,” he said. “This investigation and prosecution is an important step in that direction.”

While her attorney could not immediately be reached Thursday, Lambert Junttila announced last week that she expected to be indicted in the case. But she has argued she did not commit any crimes because local election clerks had authorized access to their equipment. 

“I'm not losing any sleep over this,” Lambert Junttila said on a conservative podcast. “I know that I've done absolutely nothing illegal. My clients have not done anything illegal.”

The charges are the latest in a series of mounting legal woes for Trump and loyalists. The former president was indicted Tuesday on federal charges stemming from his failed bid to overturn the 2020 election. Just hours earlier, Hilson charged DePerno and Rendon in the Michigan tabulator tampering case. 

Sixteen other Republicans are facing charges in a "false electors" case, including former Michigan GOP co-chair Meshawn Maddock, who has pleaded not guilty and is due in court Friday for a probable cause hearing.

Lambert Junttila is one of nine suspects Nessel identified last fall, alleging an illegal attempt to access voting machines to try and prove Trump's unfounded claims the 2020 contest was rigged against him. 

But six of those suspects won’t face charges, Hilson said Thursday, including Leaf, the Barry County sheriff who had plotted to seize voting machines after the 2020 election and last year accused state police of interfering with his own ongoing probe of Democrat Joe Biden’s win.

That decision not to charge others was based on "careful consideration of the totality of evidence gathered by investigators, review of the witness statements, evaluation of the law related to viable defenses, and decisions on what is fair and just,” Hilson said. 

Local election clerks that allegedly allowed DePerno and others to examine their voting equipment "had no idea the scope, nature or duration of how their tabulators were going to be manipulated,” the prosecutor added. 

And "computer experts" asked to analyze the tabulators "were also deceived by some of the charged defendants.... to falsely believe” they had lawful access to the equipment, Hilson said.

In last year's request for a special prosecutor, the attorney general’s office alleged the suspects "orchestrated a coordinated plan to gain access” to voting machines in multiple jurisdictions following the 2020 presidential election.

The suspects allegedly took five ballot tabulators from Barry, Roscommon and Missaukee counties to Oakland County. There, Michigan State Police contend the machines were "broken into" for "tests," according to court filings. 

An Oakland County judge this month paved the way for a charging decision in the tabulator tampering case by granting Hilson’s request for a legal interpretation of a law banning “undue possession” of voting equipment. 

Only the Secretary of State or a court can authorize access to a voting machine, Judge Phyllis McMillan ruled.

Lambert Junttila lives in metro Detroit but has worked for election deniers in multiple states, including Pennsylvania, where a cybersecurity expert alleges she refused to pay him after he found no evidence of fraud there, according to a recent lawsuit. 

Patrick Bryne, a former Overstock.com CEO who has backed amateur election investigations across the country, recently said on Twitter that he has helped fund Lambert Junttila's legal work "to the tune of millions of dollars."

Lambert Junttila was one of nine attorneys, led by Trump loyalist Sidney Powell, that tried to block certification of Michigan's 2020 election. 

A federal judge sanctioned Lambert Junttila for her role in that case, calling it “frivolous.”  But the U.S. Court of Appeals reversed that decision in June, ruling that Lambert Junttila had played only a "minimal" role in the case. 

The Michigan Attorney Grievance Commission subsequently moved to withdraw a related professional misconduct claim against Lambert Junttila, according to a filing published Monday by the state Attorney Discipline Board.