The Washington state Attorney General’s office is seeking permission to file three additional counts of fourth-degree assault with sexual motivation in an ongoing case against Asotin County Superior Court judge Scott Gallina.
Gallina, who has been on the bench in Asotin, Garfield and Columbia counties for the past five years, is already facing charges of second-degree rape, indecent liberties and two counts of fourth-degree assault with sexual motivation involving two victims. He has pleaded not guilty to all of those charges.
In the latest information, a woman verified she made it clear to Gallina that his behavior and actions needed to stop in the summer of 2017.
Another alleged victim was able to verify two more incidents involving the judge during follow-up interviews with police. The same woman wrote the judge a letter in September asking him to stop his “lewd and lascivious” behavior.
According to court documents, nine women reported varying degrees of workplace sexual misconduct by Gallina from the time he was appointed to the bench in 2014 to when the investigation was launched this spring. The women said the judge routinely made sexually suggestive comments and touched them in a sexual manner without consent. (Lewiston Tribune)
