Commission recommends removal of Hicks

The state Judicial Standards Commission has recommended that Lincoln County Justice of the Peace Gary Hicks be removed from office following allegations of inappropriate sexual advances toward female defendants.

The commission – which heard testimony in August from victims, law-enforcement officers, court officials, and a statistics expert – found that Hicks’ conduct with eight of the nine women who filed complaints violated Montana’s code of judicial ethics.

But before it is adopted, the recommendation reached last week by the five-member commission must be reviewed by the full Montana Supreme Court.

The state’s highest court could decide to give Hicks a chance to respond to the commission’s recommendation in writing, hold a separate hearing – which most likely wouldn’t be evidentiary in nature – or simply announce a decision, said prosecuting attorney Stephen C. Berg, of Kalispell.

Hicks, meanwhile, has been suspended with pay from serving as a judicial officer pending the Supreme Court review of the proceedings. No date for that review has been set.

Berg said Monday the commission’s findings should have been expected.

“Based on the evidence and credibility of the nine women, supported by the testimony of others, including the counselors of two of the women Š I thought this was a very strong case and I’m not surprised by the outcome,” he said.

The commission found that Hicks’ conduct ran afoul of ethical provisions on impropriety, social relations, and the mandate that a judge’s behavior “be above reproach.”

During the August testimony in front of the Judicial Standards Commission, nine women accused Hicks of soliciting sexual contact in exchange for leniency.

One woman, who was appearing in 2006 on a theft charge, testified that Hicks told her she had “cute little toes” and that someday she would owe him for coming in on a weekend.

“He touched the bottom of my feet. Š I was uncomfortable and kind of confused by what he said about ‘I would owe him,’” she said.

The commission found that Hicks later visited the woman on the false pretext of official judicial duties, reportedly when he thought her boyfriend would be gone, after all issues in any pending cases had been resolved.

“He had no reason in the world be there other than to promote sexual activity with her,” Berg said.

The commission also found that Hicks said to a woman who appeared on a contempt charge for failure to pay fines that she was “too pretty to be dressed in blue” and visited the home of woman who had appeared to apply for a restraining order to ask if she wanted “an old gray-haired judge for a boyfriend.”

Hicks told a fourth woman he would woo her “in ways that none of the young men could” and gave her his phone number. He later set bail for the woman, who had been charged with possession of stolen property, at $50,000. A District Court judge later released the woman on her own recognizance. The commission found that Hicks’ decision to set such high bail, made after the commission’s investigation had been launched, was retaliatory in nature.

In response, Kalispell defense attorney Tammi Fisher produced a statistics expert who said – based on a study of cases from 2005-08 – that Hicks did not favor men or women in a large majority of 32 categories of various offenses.

Fisher was unavailable for comment.

Earlier this month, Hicks sued Lincoln County alleging that the board of commissioners persecuted and harassed him between Aug. 20 and Sept. 26.

The lawsuit seeks punitive damages and charges the intentional infliction of emotional distress, slander, and the alternative liability of Lincoln County under the legal doctrine of “respondeat superior” – which states that in some circumstances the employer is responsible for the actions of employees.

“We dispute all of his allegations,” said the commissioners’ attorney, Sean Goicoechea, who called the commissioners’ actions in response to the allegations against Hicks “justified.”

Hicks previously filed suit against Lincoln County on Aug. 13, alleging that the county was responsible for paying his legal fees. Flathead County District Court Judge Katherine R. Curtis ruled that Lincoln County must pay those fees and the two sides negotiated a $40,000 settlement. At last report, fees had totaled nearly $60,000.

(Nicholas Ledden is a reporter for the Daily Inter Lake in Kalispell).