Exclusive: Tri-Cities judge on leave after ex-girlfriend alleges harassment

A Tri-Cities judge is on leave after a court employee accused him of harassment following their five-month personal relationship.

Judge Sam Swanberg, who’s been on the Benton-Franklin Superior Court bench for four years, is the subject of a new civil action filed days before Christmas.

Since the petition was filed in his own court, the temporary anti-harassment protection order was sent to a Spokane County Superior Court judge to be reviewed and signed.

A hearing to consider entering a permanent order is scheduled Wednesday before Judge Harold D. Clarke III.

Clarke already has denied a request for Swanberg to surrender his weapons, according to documents obtained by the Tri-City Herald.

Sila Salas, Swanberg’s ex-girlfriend, in her petition to the court detailed numerous attempts by Swanberg to talk with her in the month after their breakup.

Salas, 24, said she repeatedly told Swanberg, 55, they were done and she was not going to give him another chance. However, he continued to call, send messages, stop by her house or work, and even had his mother talk with her, she wrote.

“I feel harassed and I am in a lot of distress for the last month. I deserve self peace and to feel safe,” Salas, who is representing herself, said in her petition for a protection order.

The 19-page document has copies of multiple text messages between the former couple, including a lengthy “proposal” from Swanberg to immediately move in together, get engaged by Valentine’s Day 2022, get married, have children and “spend the rest of our lives together because we are in love and are happier with each other than without, or with anyone else.”

Salas wrote that she reported Swanberg’s alleged behavior and actions to the Benton County Sheriff’s Office, which opened an investigation.

It is not known if Salas also filed a complaint with the Washington state Commission on Judicial Conduct, since the board — which investigates allegations of ethical misconduct and abuse of authority — does not discuss its cases in the early stages of review.

Swanberg’s lawyer, John Jensen of Kennewick, told the Tri-City Herald “this involved the breakup of a serious relationship and there are no allegations of domestic violence or threats.”

Jensen had no other comment on Salas’ accusations against his client.

Protection order

The temporary order prohibits Swanberg from being within 500 feet of Salas’ residence or workplace.

Salas works for the Benton County Office of Public Defense in the Benton County Justice Center in Kennewick. It is the same building that houses Superior Court, and where Swanberg has an office.

After the temporary order took effect Dec. 22, court administration reportedly scrambled to make sure Swanberg was not assigned to any hearings in Benton County. His main chambers are in the Franklin County Courthouse in Pasco.

Swanberg is one of seven Superior Court judges and three court commissioners who handle civil and felony criminal cases, divorces, paternity and custody issues in the two counties.

He is the bicounty court’s administrative presiding judge for 2021-22, with Judge Jackie Shea Brown serving as the assistant presiding judge.

Asked Monday how this case has affected operations, court administration told the Herald: “Judge Swanberg is on leave at this time. In the interim, Judge Shea Brown is the administrative presiding judge and Judge (Jacqueline) Stam is the assistant administrative presiding judge.”

“The court has conducted and will continue to conduct business in the normal course for the communities and people it serves,” the statement said.

Appointed in 2017

Swanberg was appointed by Gov. Jay Inslee in August 2017 to replace the retiring Judge Vic VanderSchoor.

Swanberg then was elected to retain the seat in 2018, and again in 2020. He has three years left on his current four-year term.

He became a lawyer in 1992 after getting his undergraduate and law degrees from Brigham Young University in Utah. He spent three years as a Franklin County deputy prosecutor before going into private practice up until his judicial appointment.

Swanberg filed to divorce his wife in December 2020. That case was handled in Lincoln County Superior Court, and finalized last April.

He has six children and at least one grandchild.

Swanberg and Salas started dating early last spring when Salas worked for the Franklin County Clerk’s Office in the Franklin County Courthouse. At some point Salas resigned, mentioning in one text message a photo Swanberg had posted of them on Facebook.

They broke up Nov. 21.

Two weeks later, Swanberg showed up uninvited at 7:20 a.m. at Salas’ apartment. She did not answer the door. That was followed by a voicemail the same day.

‘No point going on’

Over the ensuing weeks, Swanberg left more voicemails, sent text messages and emails, returned to Salas’ home with a letter and contacted one of her friends and asked the woman to mediate their relationship, according to the petition.

Salas said she told Swanberg not to contact her. But after he wrote, “I’m in love with you to the point that’s [sic] there’s no point in going on without you. Goodbye,” she reached out to him a couple of days later because she was concerned Swanberg was suicidal.

Swanberg said in a document filed this week that he was not suicidal and that he was only expressing how he was the happiest when with Salas. He said his “goodbye” was because Salas had asked not to be contacted further.

A week after the concerning exchange, on Dec. 21, Swanberg approached Salas’ car before work outside the Justice Center and said they needed to talk.

Salas said she told him to leave and didn’t want to put her job at risk, and finally got away from him by agreeing to meet after work. She wrote that she did not intend to actually text him later so they could meet up.

Once inside her office, Salas said she spoke about the situation with her boss, public defense manager and attorney Eric Hsu, then sent Swanberg an email saying “what he did was too much and to please not contact me anymore.”

Salas said maybe 10 minutes passed before Swanberg came into the Office of Public Defense looking for her.

“I am worried and stressed. I have addressed multiple times to stop contacting me and it simply continues to where Sam showed up at my office. I tried leaving the office and he followed me,” she wrote.

“At this point I am not sure where to hide. I just want this behavior to stop.”

In one message to an unknown person, Swanberg said it was his “first real dating experience” since his divorce and agreed he is “clumsy” because he was a teenager when he last dated.

Salas asked Swanberg in a message to respect her privacy and stop contacting her “through any mediums.”

“It really sucks that you had to lose me to realize that (they belonged together). What we had it’s not restorable,” she wrote.

Relationship breakup

Swanberg replied that he was not going to give up on them and asked if they could try being friends for a while.

He suggested in his proposal that they live together in his rental home, and his mother would move into Salas’ apartment until her lease is up. He said the rent for the apartment would be paid from his income.

Superior Court judges in Washington currently make just under $200,000 a year.

Swanberg also wrote that if Salas were to marry him, it would be his sole purpose in life to make her happy and amazed that she chose him, and that he would be “the luckiest man on earth,” according to text messages.

Jensen, Swanberg’s attorney, filed a declaration Monday in opposition to the no-contact order.

Swanberg responded to Salas’ claims, saying he never suggested that he would intentionally harm himself and was only expressing that he will not find happiness with anyone after her.

When Salas reached out to him out of concern over that text, Swanberg said he “mistakenly took this as a possibility that since she still cared about me that she may be open to reconciliation.”

He described it as “an exclusive five-month long intense dating relationship” and said the two had mutually discussed marriage.

He said he gave Salas a promise ring in mid-October and, though there had been “several bumps in the road,” they usually worked things out when they communicated in person instead of through text messages.

Swanberg said in his declaration that’s why he tried to contact Salas in the parking lot outside the Justice Center. He also went into her office hoping to run into Salas, even though he said he had no intention of speaking with her at that time.

The judge said he sent one final text to Salas that he felt he had an obligation to disclose their relationship to the Office of Public Defense and the county prosecutor.

“Since this last text, I have had no further contact or attempted contact with her,” Swanberg wrote in his declaration. “At this time, regardless of any orders from this court, I am past any illusion that she wants to reconcile with me.”

“At no time during any of our contacts did I threaten or intimidate Ms. Salas,” he added. “During the entire course of our relationship I don’t believe we ever even raised our voices with each other or uttered a harsh word.”

This story was originally published January 4, 2022 at 12:54 PM.