Highlights
- Peter Morey served on Arizona's new Sex Offender Management Board in 2025 despite his Oregon medical license being suspended in 2010 for inappropriate behavior toward vulnerable patients.
- Morey, now an attorney at the Maricopa County Office of the Legal Advocate, earns at least $114,500 a year and was admitted to the Arizona State Bar in 2015.
- House Speaker Steve Montenegro's office says it checked only that Morey was in good standing with the State Bar before appointing him; no background check on prior licensing history was conducted.
- A former patient, Michelle Stevenson, testified before the board in June that her written warning about Morey was not published in the May public-comment packet as she had requested.
A Maricopa County attorney who lost his Oregon psychiatry license in 2010 after a state medical board found he posed an immediate danger to patients spent months on Arizona's newly formed Sex Offender Management Board before being quietly removed in March, according to reporting by the Arizona Mirror.
Peter Morey, whose title at the Maricopa County Office of the Legal Advocate is Attorney III, is paid at least $114,500 a year and has provided legal advice to sexually violent predators since 2015, he told the board's Adult Guidelines and Standards Subcommittee at a February meeting. He was one of two appointees named to the board by Arizona House Speaker Steve Montenegro in 2025, when the board was formed under statute.
The Oregon Medical Board's 2010 emergency suspension order found that Morey had improperly prescribed medication and engaged in inappropriate relationships with patients. The board documented that Morey met with one patient in a vacant space near his clinic and at his office, where he engaged in inappropriate touching, embracing her, kissing her, and stroking her hair. On multiple occasions, the board found, he initiated sexualized conversations with that patient about his own sexual activities and about her relationship with her then-boyfriend.
A subsequent civil lawsuit filed by that patient, identified in board records as Patient A, alleged Morey offered her a job while she was a client, called her his "Girl Friday" and called her "family," rubbed her back and told her not to tell other physicians, and gave her medications without a prescription. The case settled out of court.
Andrew Wilder, a spokesperson for Montenegro, told the Mirror that the speaker's staff checked only that Morey was an attorney in good standing with the State Bar of Arizona before making the appointment. Montenegro learned of Morey after he was recommended by board chair Beth Goulden, who said in an email to the Mirror that she referred Morey after he was suggested by colleagues who worked with him through his position at Maricopa County. Goulden said she had never spoken to any of Morey's victims or accusers.
The Arizona Department of Public Safety, which oversees the board, declined to comment beyond a statement that the agency does not interfere with the statutory appointment authority of other entities and that state law does not authorize DPS to background-check appointees.
The information was not hidden. The third Google result for "Peter Morey Psychiatrist" returns records of the Oregon suspension and the allegations against him, the Mirror noted.
Michelle Stevenson, a former patient who sought Morey's help as an adult to cope with childhood sexual trauma and to enlist him as an expert witness in a potential lawsuit against a church, testified before the board at its June 22 meeting. She said she had submitted a written warning about Morey in time for the May public-comment packet but that the letter was not published, despite her explicit request that it be made public. "This is what happens when survivors are silenced and crimes are covered up," Stevenson told the board. "The abuse continues and more innocents are horribly hurt."
Morey was removed from the board and replaced without any formal announcement. On April 16, Montenegro appointed Dr. Rene Rivera of PCS Forensics to fill the seat.
Morey obtained his law degree from Arizona Summit Law School, a for-profit Phoenix institution that lost its American Bar Association accreditation in 2018 and shut down. He was admitted to the Arizona State Bar in 2015. Under Arizona Supreme Court rules, bar applications are confidential, so it is not known whether Morey disclosed his Oregon licensing history to bar officials. The court's application checklist expressly requires applicants to detail the outcomes of any prior disciplinary actions or licenses they previously held.
Maricopa County said in a statement to the Mirror that it would investigate recent public statements related to Morey. Morey did not respond to multiple calls and emails seeking comment.
Who appointed Morey, and why wasn't his history flagged?
The law governing the board allows the president of the Senate and the speaker of the House to each appoint two members. Montenegro's office says it relied on Goulden's recommendation and a State Bar standing check, neither of which would surface an out-of-state medical board suspension. DPS says it has no statutory authority to vet appointees. The result: no single entity conducted a background check that would have caught a publicly searchable Oregon disciplinary record.
The House says it learned of the Oregon allegations at the end of March and immediately began the process of replacing Morey, completing the new appointment on April 16. The board's next scheduled meeting will be the first opportunity for members to formally address the gap in its vetting process.
Where to find them
Sources
Every factual claim in this article traces to one of the sources below. See how we work for the editorial process.
- azmirror.com retrieved 09/07/2026 18:35
- State Bar (official site) retrieved 09/07/2026 18:35
- American Bar (official site) retrieved 09/07/2026 18:35
Authored by The Scottsdale Signal. Drafted by AI from primary-source material under our beat-specific editorial guides; reviewed by humans before publish under our five-gate process. Sources retrieved at 09/07/2026 18:35. Every claim traces to a source.
