A former Tri-Cities judge should never be allowed to serve on the bench again, state commission ruled on Friday.
An eight-member panel of Washington state Commission on Judicial Conduct ruled that former Superior Court Judge Sam Swanberg should be censured and banned from serving as a judge.
The commission’s decision now goes to the Washington State Supreme Court for a final determination.
Swanberg served nearly seven years in Benton and Franklin counties. He stepped down voluntarily on May 17 even though he’d been acquitted by a Franklin County jury of domestic violence involving his former wife.
He is still an attorney and a censure by the Supreme Court would not change that.
Three days after he left his job as a judge, the state commission held its fact-finding hearing. Swanberg refused to defend himself, but he was called as a witness and gave some testimony.
The state commission found the judge violated three of the rules that guide the behavior of judges by “engaging in physically violent and emotionally abusive behavior over the decades of his marriage” and “that he harassed and stalked” his ex-girlfriend after the end of his relationship.