The state commission charged with reviewing the conduct of judges is mulling a complaint against Oregon Supreme Court Chief Justice Martha Walters regarding the ouster of the state public defense director.

The Commission on Judicial Fitness and Disability will take up the complaint at its closed-door Nov. 18 meeting, The Oregonian has learned.

The news casts another cloud on the 71-year-old chief justice, who announced Tuesday she would retire from her $180,000-a-year post at the end of the year.

Walters’ conduct is already at the center of a $2.4 million lawsuit filed Oct. 11 by former public defense leader Stephen Singe r, who alleges the chief justice had him fired for refusing to use unqualified lawyers to fill the gap in public defenders.

Walters stepped publicly into the fray in August, when the state commission controlling the Office of Public Defense Services failed to fire Singer.

She then removed all the commission’s members and replaced most of Singer’s supporters. The reformed commission then removed Singer from the job.

Singer said he didn’t file the complaint against Walters, but added he’s “not surprised.”

A spokesperson for Walters said the chief justice hadn’t read the complaint and wasn’t previously aware of it. Walters has previously suggested Singer had to go because he didn’t act with enough urgency to address the lack of public defenders, which has left hundreds of Oregonians facing criminal charges without a court-appointed lawyer.

“I also have heard it said that … it is acceptable to leave defendants in jail without representation to provide an avenue to prompt movement on the longer-term problem,” Walters wrote to public defense commissioners in July.

The judicial fitness process is deliberately opaque under Oregon law, with even the mere existence of complaints kept secret unless the investigation reaches the prosecutorial stage.

Meanwhile, the lack of public defenders due to low pay, high turnover and new caseload caps continues at a boil — with nearly 50 unrepresented defendants stuck behind bars, another 730 out of custody and 500 with active warrants.

On Thursday, the Oregon Justice Resource Center, a civil rights law firm, launched a second class-action suit against the state on behalf of four criminal defendants who don’t have a public defender.

The nonprofit filed similar litigation in May demanding the state either dismiss charges or appoint lawyers for several unrepresented defendants.

Most of them eventually had their criminal cases dismissed or were appointed counsel. In September, Multnomah County Circuit Judge Shelley Russell dismissed the suit, saying she didn’t have jurisdiction because the cases should be resolved in criminal, not civil, court.

Oregon Justice Resource Center lawyer Ben Haile said unrepresented defendants face the stress of uncertainty, plus repercussions to employment and family life, while their cases remain in limbo. A defense lawyer’s ability to seek out and preserve evidence also grows more difficult, he said