A North Whidbey man who once was the leader of the county’s Republican Party lost his job and faces jail time after a jury found him guilty of a felony charge related to his refusal to wear a mask in the Island County Elections Office last year.

Timothy Hazelo is scheduled to be sentenced in Island County Superior Court on Aug. 25. Island County Prosecutor Greg Banks filed a memorandum this week in which he asks the judge to sentence 57-year-old Hazelo to seven days in jail, place him on probation for a year and order him to perform 80 hours of community service for an apolitical nonprofit entity.

“The state’s sentencing recommendation is intended to give Mr. Hazelo an opportunity to reflect upon his misguided behavior from the inside of a jail cell,” Banks wrote in the memorandum. “At the same time, the state has no interest in providing Mr. Hazelo a platform from which to continue to raise money and promote his false self-aggrandizing narrative that he is somehow fighting ‘tyranny.’”

On July 10, a jury found Hazelo guilty of unauthorized access to a voting center, a felony, and criminal trespass in the first degree, a gross misdemeanor. In the sentencing memorandum, Banks agrees to vacate the criminal trespass charge to avoid double jeopardy.

Hazelo is facing a standard sentencing range of 0-365 days in jail.

Hazelo is looking to the courts for salvation. He and his attorneys — he now has three — are asking the judge to order a new trial. If Snohomish County Superior Court Judge Joseph Wilson doesn’t give him a new trial, Hazelo said he and his attorney may appeal; Wilson is handling the case after Island County judges recused themselves.

Hazelo said the cost of an appeal is an important consideration for him.

“At this point I’m going broke and it’s happening fast since I don’t have any employment,” he said, adding that whether he loses his gun ownership and voting rights will also weigh on his decision to appeal.

Hazelo and his co-plaintiff, Tracy Abuhl, are already appealing Wilson’s decision to dismiss their motion for civil injunction to prevent Island County Auditor Sheilah Crider from enforcing a mask mandate in the Elections Office. Hazelo said the case appears to be moving quicker than expected through the state Court of Appeals.

In addition, Hazelo said he is exploring the idea of suing the company Valiant Integrated Services for wrongful termination. Hazelo worked as a flight simulator technician for the P-8 Poseidon at Naval Air Station Whidbey Island, a job that required security clearance. He said he disclosed to his company that he was cited last November for alleged disorderly conduct and later charged with a felony. He claims he was told by a security manager for the company that a conviction would not likely affect his security clearance because of the nature of the charge.

It turns out, Hazelo said, that someone at the company failed to disclose the information to Navy officials as required. When the commodore of Patrol and Reconnaissance Wing 10 found out another way, he was not happy about being blindsided and revoked Hazelo’s security clearance. Valiant officials then fired Hazelo, who emphasized that he didn’t blame the commodore for his decision.

“The problem was that the company didn’t disclose it,” he said. “I don’t think it would have been a problem for me if it had been properly disclosed.”

Hazelo said he received an email from a security manager who admitted the failure was the company’s fault. The union is backing him in an effort to get his job back. He is also applying for unemployment and taking odd jobs.

“I never expected to get charged,” he said, “let alone to get to this point.”

Valiant didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

After his conviction, Hazelo hired attorneys Angus Lee and Joel Ard to assist with the case. With the help of videos he posted to Facebook, Hazelo has raised about $27,000 for his defense through small donations to his Gifts & Go online account. He said he’s paid his original attorney, Austin Hatcher, about $24,000 so far for defense work.

The sentencing hearing at 1 p.m. on Monday may draw a crowd. The case has garnered attention in Whidbey Island social media and political circles and made regional and national news. Political commentators in Seattle covered the story. In a video posted on social media and YouTube, Hazelo asked people to attend the hearing to show support for him.

“We need as many people as we can in that courtroom,” he said in the video. “We want to pack that courtroom.”

Hazelo hopes that the sentencing won’t happen at all. His attorneys filed motions asking the judge to arrest judgment, vacate the verdict and dismiss the charges against him on the grounds that the charging document was defective in not alleging all essential elements to constitute a crime and that there was insufficient evidence of a crime presented at trial.

The motion for a new trial repeats Hazelo’s argument that the auditor does not have authority under the law to impose a mask mandate.

“There is simply no basis to interpret RCW 29A.84.555 as giving the auditor any authority to impose a mask mandate. Such an interpretation would be absurd, and the rule of lenity explicitly prohibits adopting such a strained reading,” the motion states.

In fact, the Appeals Court decision in the civil case could have an impact on an appeal of the criminal case if the court finds that the auditor doesn’t have the authority to impose the mandate after all.

The sentencing memorandum written by the prosecutor explains some of the background in the case, including an attempt at a plea bargain.

On Nov. 4, 2024, Hazelo was acting as an election observer for the Island County Republican Party and entered a ballot processing room where ballots for the general presidential election were being processed. He was the chair of the county party at the time.

In her authority as the auditor, Crider required all staff and visitors to wear protective face masks while in the ballot processing room. It was a response to a COVID-19 outbreak during the primary election recount which endangered the group of elderly election workers.

Hazelo, however, refused to wear a mask, even after being reminded by a staff member and offered a chair outside the room where he could still observe but didn’t need a mask. The Coupeville marshal contacted Hazelo and attempted to get him to comply with the mask rule or leave the room. Hazelo refused and insisted on getting a citation, according to the police report. The marshal eventually agreed.

In interviews with the News-Times, Hazelo said his motivation wasn’t really about making a statement about masks but that he wanted to test whether a county official has the legal authority to make such a health-related rule. It’s an unsettled area of law, he said.

“My whole goal was to get this issue before the court,” he said.

Banks originally charged Hazelo in Island County District Court with the misdemeanor offenses of criminal trespass in the first degree and disorderly conduct. The prosecutor proposed a deal in which Hazelo would plead guilty to the misdemeanors and he wouldn’t be charged with the felony offense of unauthorized access to a voting center. In exchange, the prosecutor would recommend a sentence of three days in jail.

Hazelo rejected the offer without explanation or a counteroffer, Banks wrote.

For the hearing next week, Banks recommends that Hazelo serve “at least seven days” in jail, along with community custody and 80 hours of community restitution. Other recommended conditions are that Hazelo not go to the Elections Office in Coupeville and that he has no contact with Crider or Elections Supervisor Michele Reagan, unless it’s related to an elective office for which Hazelo is a candidate.

“Mr. Hazelo disrespected the institutions and the orderly processes of good governance by his stunt,” Bank wrote in the memorandum. “He disdained the sacrifice and service of a cadre of elderly election workers, whose only motivation was to ensure the public had confidence in the administration of our vital elections. His jocular demeanor on the police body cameras shows that he is not a serious man. For him, it was a lark, complete with multiple videos produced for social media publication. From a position of leadership, he did not take seriously his responsibility to lead.”

In the memorandum, Banks requests that the judge order Hazelo to be taken into custody in the courtroom immediately.