Marty Jackley

He previously served as the 39th United States Attorney for the District of South Dakota.

Martin J. Jackley (born October 13, 1970) is an American attorney and politician who is currently serving as the Attorney General of South Dakota since 2023, having previously served from 2009 to 2019.

He assumed office as Attorney General again in 2023 after winning the 2022 election unopposed.

Jackley was raised in Sturgis, South Dakota, and graduated from Sturgis Brown High School in 1988.

He graduated cum laude from the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology in 1992 with his Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering.

He earned his Juris Doctor from the University of South Dakota School of Law in 1995.

From 1995 through 1997, Jackley served as a law clerk for the then-former Chief Judge Richard Battey of the United States District Court for the District of South Dakota.

Jackley joined the Rapid City law firm of Gunderson, Palmer, Nelson, and Ashmore.

As a partner, his practice areas focused on construction & engineering law and real property disputes.

At that time, he also served as a Special Assistant Attorney General for South Dakota prosecuting controlled substance felonies.

In 2006, Jackley was recommended by U.S. Senator John Thune to replace Steven K. Mullin as United States Attorney for the District of South Dakota and was nominated by President George W. Bush.

Jackley was unanimously confirmed by the U.S. Senate.

He was named the South Dakota Prosecutor of the Year in 2008 from the South Dakota State's Attorneys Association.

Jackley was succeeded as U.S. Attorney by Brendan Johnson.

Governor Mike Rounds appointed Jackley to succeed Larry Long as Attorney General of South Dakota in 2009 after Long was appointed as a local judge.

Jackley won reelection in 2010 and in 2014.

EB-5 was a national investor-visa program which granted green cards to undocumented immigrants and their families who have invested $500,000 in approved but not guaranteed investments.

South Dakota and Vermont were the only states that managed EB-5 funds through a state controlled entity.

On October 20, 2013, Richard Benda died from a gunshot wound.

Approximately a month and a half later Jackley stated that the death was a suicide.

Initially it was questioned how a man could kill oneself with a shotgun.

Then an updated attorney general's report said that a stick was used without explanation.

Benda had served as Governor Mike Rounds director of economic development.

Nearly 3 years after Benda's death, Jackley charged Joop Bollen relating to the EB-5 scandal with five felony counts of unauthorized disposal of personal property to security interest.

On January 18, 2013, Jackley testified before the Senate State Affairs Committee in support of SB 70.

On February 6, 2013, Governor Dennis Daugaard signed SB 70 into law.

The bill has been heavily criticized by law enforcement and public officials as being detrimental to public safety.

On Wednesday, June 4, 2014, one day after the losing the U.S. Senate primary, physician Annette Bosworth was arrested on charges brought by Jackley regarding perjury and filing false documents.

On September 17, 2015, Scott Westerhuis shot and killed his four children, his wife, Nicole, and then set his house on fire, before killing himself.

Westerhuis was the business manager of Mid Central Educational Cooperative, which was contracted out by the state to distribute grant money.

Hours before the Westerhuis home was found burning, Mid-Central Educational Cooperative, where Scott Westerhuis was the business manager, had lost a multi-million dollar state contract.

The decision by the state came after a series of financial problems turned up in audits of the business that administered a program that encourages Native American Students to go to college, called GEAR UP.

On January 23, 2015, Jackley testified before the Senate State Affairs Committee in support of SB 73.

On March 13, 2015, Governor Dennis Daugaard signed SB 73 into law.

In February 2017, Bollen plead guilty to one count of the little-known crime of “unauthorized disposal of personal property subject to a security interest” and was sentenced to a $2,000 fine and two years of probation.

He ran unsuccessfully for Governor of South Dakota in 2018, losing to Republican primary to Kristi Noem.

Nearly, three years later in June 2018, Jackley lost the first of three possible GEAR UP cases as the jury acquitted Stephanie Hubers was found not guilty of grand theft, grand theft by deception and alternative receiving stolen property charges.

In September 2018, Jackley made a plea deal with Dan Guericke the former educational cooperative director, wherein Guericke pled guilty to one felony count of falsifying evidence.

Guericke had originally been charged with six felony counts alleging that he falsified evidence and conspired to offer forged or fraudulent evidence.

In October 2018, Jackley lost his second Gear Up jury trial when the jury acquitted Stacy Phelps, the former CEO of the American Institute for Innovation, on all charges.