OLYMPIA, Wash. -- Charlie Wiggins doesn't want just any seat on the Washington State Supreme Court -- he wants the seat held by Justice Richard B. Sanders.

During an interview Monday, the Bainbridge Island attorney and former appellate judge made it clear he is running against Sanders not only because he has issues with Sanders' ethics but also with his voting record.

"It's not easy to defeat an incumbent, especially a judge," Wiggins said. "The question you have to ask yourself is, 'What's wrong with Justice Sanders and why is he in the news so much?'"

For starters, Wiggins said, there was the justice's tour of the state's sex-predator center at McNeil Island, where he met with some patients who had cases pending before the court. The Washington State Commission on Judicial Conduct in 2005 admonished Sanders for the tour.

The discipline -- the mildest sanction available -- was narrowly upheld by a special appeals panel sitting in for the Supreme Court. It said Sanders' visit created an appearance of partiality.

Members of the high court were invited to tour the Special Commitment Center by a resident there. Sanders was the only justice who took the tour in 2003.

"Several judges told him not to go," said Wiggins. "You just don't do that sort of thing. It's a matter of integrity."

Then there's the court ruling on public records Sanders authored even as he was pursuing his own public records lawsuit in Thurston County.

"That to me is a no-brainer," said Wiggins. "You can't write an opinion that favors yourself."

The state Supreme Court withdrew the ruling after attorneys for King County, the losing party, argued that Sanders had a conflict of interest because he didn't disclose that the ruling impacted a public-disclosure lawsuit he filed in Thurston County in 2005 against the state attorney general. Sanders withdrew from the public-records case, which has been reargued.

Wiggins, 62, knows he faces an uphill battle to unseat Sanders, one of three justices up for reelection this year. It's likely one of the reasons Wiggins was in Yakima this week to talk about his candidacy.

He said he has the endorsement of some 40 judges, some retired but most still active, as well as a cross-section of support from Republicans and Democrats.

"It's very rare to get sitting judges to endorse against an incumbent," he said. "It tells you that a broad spectrum of judges have concerns about Judge Sanders."

Wiggins is a former Army captain and 1976 graduate of the Duke University School of Law.

For most of his career, he's been in private practice in the Puget Sound Area, specializing in appeals. However, he spent two years on the Division II Court of Appeals and has served as a pro tem judge in Superior Court in both King County and Jefferson County.

Wiggins has also been active in the Washington State Bar Association and was chairman of disciplinary board in the late 1990s. As part of his practice, he said he's had more than 50 cases before the Supreme Court.

He claims Sanders has voted 94 percent of the time against prosecutors in 350 criminal cases that resulted in split decisions. He said Sanders also voted 91 percent of the time for lesser sanctions in lawyer discipline cases, over which the Supreme Court has final say.

In other words, Wiggins said, Sanders' reputation as a libertarian maverick masks a liberal slap-on-the-wrist philosophy.

Sanders announced his intent to seek a third term last month. In a phone interview Tuesday, he accused Wiggins of using "smear and innuendo" to distort his voting record from a statistical standpoint rather than cite specifics.

"I think voters are looking for more than statistical arguments about the Supreme Court," he said, adding, "I have a record of defending indivdual rights, and I'm proud of it."

Sanders also said he remains "dumbfounded" over the McNeil Island controversy, noting that his sanction was the most minor form of discipline possible and was given only for the "appearance of impropriety."

"It would be like getting pulled over by a traffic officer who says, 'Hey, I know you didn't just run that red light but somebody thought you did, so I'm going to give you a ticket.'

* Information from The Seattle Times archives was used in this report.

• Chris Bristol can be reached at 509-577-7748 or at cbristol@yakimaherald.com

• This story has been updated to correct comments attributed to Supreme Court Justice Richard Sanders.