Former state Sen. Sonya Jaquez Lewis, D-Longmont, was sentenced Friday to two years of supervised probation and 150 hours of community service, and a $3,000 fine, to be waived if she completes an additional 100 hours of community service.

The probation sentence is for two years for each count, to run concurrently.

Jaquez Lewis was sentenced after a Jan. 28 conviction, through a jury trial, on one count of attempting to influence a public servant and three counts of forgery. All are felonies.

She could have been sentenced for up to six years in prison with a $500,000 fine on the influence count alone, according to Denver District Court Judge Anita Schutte.

Jaquez Lewis was indicted last July for submitting forged letters to a state Senate ethics committee in January 2025 that was investigating her for mistreatment of legislative aides.

The allegations stemmed from a workplace harassment complaint filed Nov. 15, 2024, with the Office of Legislative Workplace Relations by the Political Workers’ Guild, which represents aides, on behalf of five former aides.

The complaint alleged she paid an aide to do landscaping work and tend bar, and that she paid him with a campaign check. She did not report those expenditures in her campaign finance reports. She also paid the aide to knock on doors for an Adams County commissioner candidate in the June primary who faced off against the wife of one of Jaquez Lewis’ legislative rivals, according to reports.  

Jaquez Lewis submitted a 17-page response that included several purported letters of support from former aides and friends.

When the committee learned on Feb. 11 that one of the letters may have been forged, they asked their attorney to contact the writers of the other letters to determine whether they were authentic.

Jaquez Lewis resigned her Senate seat on Feb. 17, the day before the committee was to meet to discuss the response.

At that Feb. 18 meeting, Sen. Dylan Roberts, D-Frisco, a former assistant district attorney, said not only did Jaquez Lewis “fabricate” the letter, but that it could also violate Colorado state law, along with other potential violations of campaign finance and other laws.

In her allocution, Jaquez Lewis stated she was under great pressure and made “bad choices,” stating she never intended to deceive anyone.

She complained about the ethics committee process, calling the committee “biased” and the Senate’s attitude “toxic.” She told the court that a separate Secretary of State’s investigation found the allegations of mistreatment of aides to be false.

However, according to the settlement agreement filed in November, Jaquez Lewis was found to have violated campaign finance laws multiple times and was fined $2,749. She paid it several days later.

The allegation of mistreating aides was not part of the campaign finance complaint, which dealt with how she paid her aides for several activities and failure to report those payments.

She said she hoped her case would not give legislative leaders the ability “to settle political scores” in the courtroom.

Jaquez Lewis said she could have done a better job of “conveying my supporters’ beliefs” to the ethics committee. She claimed that when she realized the “mistake” she had made in submitting the letters, she apologized at the time and took responsibility for her actions.

She did say she’d found a silver lining: “I have learned who my true friends are,” she said.

But she did not apologize to the victims, her constituents, the state Senate or the public Friday, and continued to maintain that submitting the letters was an accident and not intentional.

That wasn’t persuasive to the jury, Chief Deputy District Attorney Robert Nitido said, nor to him.

This wasn’t a mistake or an accident, Nitido said. “This was purposeful conduct,” to take other people’s names and reputations in an attempt to beat an ethics complaint.

She can say she didn’t believe the allegations in the complaint “until she’s blue in the face,” Nitido said.

He called her actions “cruel,” pointing out that one of the letters contained insults. Jaquez Lewis used that letter to attack her accusers, but thought it would be better for it to come from the letter rather than from her own defense.

An impact statement submitted by that victim said Jaquez Lewis harmed her reputation and relationships and that she felt violated.

The other letter that Nitido called cruel came from a friend, and was provided to the ethics committee around Feb. 1. The friend, who had previously volunteered to write a letter of support. contacted Jaquez Lewis on Feb. 15 to ask whether she still wanted to receive the letter. Jaquez Lewis gave her the go-ahead.

It was only at trial that the friend learned that Jaquez Lewis had written a letter in her name and submitted it two weeks earlier. In a victim statement, the friend said her trust in Jaquez Lewis could never be repaired.

The third victim identified on Friday had told Jaquez Lewis she didn’t want to get involved, but the lawmaker wrote a letter under her name anyway.

Nitido asked for more than just probation, suggesting a fine or substantial community service. He said community service would be more appropriate, given the violation of trust to the public, her constituents and her friends. He suggested at least 100 hours.

In determining the sentence, Schutte said she was concerned about Jaquez Lewis’s lack of accountability. The judge said she did not find Jaquez Lewis’ claims that it was a mistake credible, nor did the jury.

Jaquez Lewis’s lack of taking responsibility, both during the trial and in her statements Friday, was also concerning, Schutte said.

Denver District Attorney John Walsh said in a statement after the sentence that the case “should send the message that elected officials will be held accountable when they break the law and violate the public’s trust. Sonya Jaquez Lewis will now pay a price for behavior that simply cannot and will not be tolerated in our community.”