By Marilyn Odendahl
The Indiana Citizen
October 2, 2025
The first pre-hearing in Indiana Attorney General’s Todd Rokita’s second disciplinary case was canceled at the request of the lawyers representing both parties, possibly indicating mediation talks are underway.
Rokita’s legal team and the Indiana Supreme Court Disciplinary Commission filed a joint motion on Sept 16 with the three-judge panel overseeing the case. The parties asked for a stay on submitting their preliminary exhibit and witness lists and for the Sept. 30 pre-hearing to be vacated.
Although the motion does not elaborate or provide any details as to what the parties have been doing or discussing, it does say the attorneys “have been engaged in productive dialogue about aspects of the pending litigation.”
The three-judge panel granted the motion on Sept. 18. All other deadlines in the proceeding, including the hearing scheduled for Dec. 18, remain in effect.
Rokita is facing allegations of professional misconduct stemming from his statement released two hours after he was publicly reprimanded byt the Supreme Court in November 2023. According to the complaint filed by the disciplinary commission in January 2025, the attorney general “retracted his acceptance of responsibility for the misconduct he swore to” that ignited the first disciplinary action. The retraction, the complaint asserts, shows Rokita was “not candid with the (Indiana Supreme Court)” when he admitted he had violated two rules of Indiana attorney professional conduct and could not have successfully defended himself if the proceeding had gone to trial.
After failing to get the second disciplinary complaint dismissed, Rokita filed a response to the commission’s complaint. He told the Supreme Court that his public statement did not contradict the conditional agreement and affidavit he signed to resolve the first disciplinary proceeding. Also, he insinuated that the current complaint against him is politically motivated.
In denying Rokita’s motion to dismiss, the Supreme Court granted his request to appoint a three-judge panel to preside over the case, rather than enlisting a single judge as is typical in disciplinary hearings. The justices further encouraged the parties to meet with a mediator to see if they could reach a settlement.
“We also encourage that (three-judge) panel to discuss with the parties whether mediation would be an appropriate next step given that their disagreement, though vehement, is narrow and stems from their previous agreement,” Justice Derek Molter wrote in the majority opinion.
On Sept. 2, the parties filed a notice with the panel that they had selected Indianapolis attorney James Riley Jr. to serve as mediator. The judges have given the parties until mid-October to reach an agreement.
The panel has not issued a ruling on a motion to intervene filed by Doug Bernacchi in August. Bernacchi, of South Bend, who had his law license suspended in November 2017, argued in his motion that the appointment of three judges to preside over Rokita’s disciplinary case violated the Supreme Court’s rules of admission and discipline and does not abide by the constitutional protections for equal protection and due process.
Rokita was first disciplined for a public comment he made about Dr. Caitlin Bernard, an Indianapolis OB/GYN, who had performed a legal abortion on a 10-year-old rape victim from Ohio in the summer of 2022.
While his office was investigating Bernard, Rokita appeared on Fox News and called the physician an “abortion activist acting as a doctor” and said she had “a history of failing to report” the abortions she performed with the state as required by law. In the conditional agreement which settled the first disciplinary case, Rokita agreed he violated professional conduct rules because his comments about Bernard could be considered as a statement about Bernard’s “character, credibility, or reputation and was made for “no substantial purpose other than to embarrass or burden” her.
Also, Rokita admitted in the conditional agreement he could not have defended himself against the misconduct changes. In exchange for his admission, he received a public reprimand.
However, after being disciplined by the Supreme Court, Rokita issued a statement saying, he had “evidence and explanation for everything I said” and that he could have fought over his comment on Fox News but settling would “save a lot of taxpayer money and distraction.”
Another pre-hearing is scheduled in Rokita’s second disciplinary case for Nov. 19.
Dwight Adams, an editor and writer based in Indianapolis, edited this article. He is a former content editor, copy editor and digital producer at The Indianapolis Star and IndyStar.com, and worked as a planner for other newspapers, including the Louisville Courier Journal.
The Indiana Citizen is a nonpartisan, nonprofit platform dedicated to increasing the number of informed and engaged Hoosier citizens. We are operated by the Indiana Citizen Education Foundation, Inc., a 501(c)(3) public charity. For questions about the story, contact Marilyn Odendahl at marilyn.odendahl@indianacitizen.org.
