Tarrant County judge accused of sexual harassment

TARRANT COUNTY, Texas – The State Commission on Judicial Conduct has issued a public reprimand to a Tarrant County district judge after it emerged that he repeatedly sexually harassed two of his colleagues.

In addition to the public warning, 231st District Court Judge Jesus Nevarez was ordered to undergo four hours of instruction – two hours on conduct and two hours on sexual harassment.

The findings listed in the warning say that a woman appointed as his associate judge was sexually harassed by Nevarez during the eight years she served under him.

According to the document, between December 2021 and June 2022, Nevarez sent late-night text messages to the associate judge in which he referred to her as “baby,” “babies,” “sweetheart,” “baby,” and “beautiful,” and also told her that he loved her.

According to the alert, Nevarez sent text messages of this type for several days in a row without receiving a response.

The associate judge eventually resigned in August 2022, the findings state. According to the alert, she allegedly made an audio recording of the conversation in which she tendered her resignation. According to the state’s findings, in the audio file, Nevarez can be heard calling her “baby” at least twice while trying to convince her to change her mind and telling her that he has “loved her forever.”

The document further states that two confidential sources testified that they had personally observed Nevarez behaving inappropriately toward the associate judge and said they would hear from her about the uncomfortable situations Nevarez had put them in.

Nevarez testified during an informal appearance related to those allegations that he and the former associate judge became friends while in law school before she worked for him. But when she started as his associate judge, Nevarez said he made a mistake by not formalizing their working relationship and instead treating her like a friend rather than a colleague, the report said.

The report goes on to say that Nevarez allegedly told the associate judge that she looked “very pretty” or “I like it, it looks good” when she wore dresses to work.

During his appearance, Nevarez reportedly admitted that he has been calling women – including his court clerks and attorneys – by pet names such as “baby,” “sweetheart,” “darling,” and “beautiful” for 40 years, and said several times that he had to be told that this behavior was inappropriate and that the associate judge never told him of her discomfort.

However, the report goes on to say that the presiding judge said she tried to tell Nevarez how uncomfortable she was with his behavior, and Nevarez responded by telling her to “make no mistake.”

A second victim, a family law attorney, also accused Nevarez of making inappropriate and unwanted personal advances toward her.

According to another former associate judge of Nevarez, the family law attorney confided that Nevarez’s continued advances toward her were so severe that she refused to enter his courtroom without being accompanied by another attorney or her paralegal, the report said.

The report also states that Nevarez has not received any sexual harassment training since receiving the complaint and has only attended sexual harassment training twice in the 11 years he has served as a district judge.