Timeline of King County Superior Court history

The Washington State Territorial Court hears trials in Seattle. Judges include prominent Seattleites Thomas Burke and Orange Jacobs (the latter a Superior Court Judge after statehood).

Anti-Chinese riots in Seattle result in the violence and the expulsion of Chinese workers. Members of the legal community who oppose the riots form the Seattle-King County Bar Association.

Statehood. The State of Washington passes its Constitution. Article IV, Section 5 establishes a trial court called Superior Court for most counties in the state. Judge Issac J. Lichtenberg, a one-legged Civil War veteran, is the first judge in King County, and hears the first trial – a divorce, Smith v. Smith.

So many cases are filed in 1889 that two more judges are appointed, Thomas Humes and Julius Stratton. Court is held in the City’s municipal building, commonly called the “Katzenjammer Castle.” Judges are paid $3,000 a year.

The Great Seattle Fire. The fire consumes most of the downtown, which is then rebuilt.

The first permanent Superior Court courthouse is built on the hill where Harborview Hospital now sits. To reach the courthouse from downtown Seattle, lawyers must climb stairs up Jefferson Street with their law books and paperwork. Lawyers climbing the stairs were known to complain with colorful language, leading to the climb being named “profanity hill.”

On July 17, the steamship Portland arrives in Seattle with gold from the Klondike. Seattle becomes the passageway to the Klondike, and many local merchants become suppliers. Thousands of people travel through Seattle. Superior Court Judges Osborn leaves the bench for the Klondike, reportedly does well; Judge Humes, having lost his re-election, leaves as well, dies of a heart attack in the Klondike; Judge Frater, the first Presiding Judge, is a member of the Arctic Club.

The Seattle-King County Bar Association commissions Ella Bush, noted Seattle artist, to paint portraits of KSCS’s first judges.

These paintings of Judges Lichtenberg and Humes are by Ella Shepard Bush, a prominent artist of the early part of the century. Six are commissioned by the King County Bar Association (see article by Shelia Farr on this web site). Unfortunately, these paintings are damaged or destroyed in the mid-2010s by the Court and only three survive.

King County Superior Court judges begin running in election as nonpartisan.

Washington Constitution amended to allow the vote for women.

Judge King Dykeman establishes a new Juvenile Court facility. The Court’s first Presiding Judge, A.W. Frater serves as its first head judge. The Court’s juvenile jurisdiction includes social work as understood by the norms of that time.

The Legislature has approved nine judges for King County Superior Court.

Reah Mary Whitehead is appointed justice of the peace for King County, which is similar to District Court or municipal court today. She is the first female judicial officer in the State.

A new King County Courthouse is built (then the County-City Building) and opens at 3rd and James. The building is five stories.

Prohibition is passed in the City of Seattle (before the 19th Amendment).

The Court now has thirteen judges.

Seven stories are added to the King County Courthouse, including a jail.

Some judges and staff leave the court to serve in the armed services in World War II.

Gordon Hirabayashi, University of Washington student and member of the American Friends (Quakers) and the Mukyōkai Christian Movement remains behind in Seattle as Japanese Americans are taken for internment. He challenges the order by offering himself for arrest. He spends nine months in the King County Jail and is tried and convicted by a federal court. His conviction in Hirabayashi v. United States is later vacated in 1987.

Judge William Wilkins presides in West Germany as one of the judges in one of the Nuremberg trials, The United States of America vs. Alfried Krupp, et al.

Judge J.T. Ronald retires at 94 years of age, the longest serving judge in State history (1909-49).

The Presiding Court in 1950, where all lawyers would meet in the morning to be assigned a judge or commissioner for their motion or trial by the Presiding Judge (president of the court). This system of trial assignment remained in effect from the 1920s until the 1980s.

A brand new separate juvenile court and detention facility is built at 12th and Alder near Seattle University.

Judge Charles Z. Smith is appointed. He is the first Black judge appointed to King County Superior Court. He is later appointed to the Washington State Supreme Court.

University of Washington Black Student Union members Aaron Dixon, Larry Gossett, Richard Gossett and Carl Miller are arrested and imprisoned in the old King County Jail in the Courthouse for a sit-in at Franklin High School civil disobedience. The old jail is later converted to offices. When Mr. Gossett is elected as King County Councilmember Gossett, he asks for the office in the location of his former jail cell.

The third new juvenile court and detention facility, called the Youth Services Center, replaces the earlier courthouse at 12th and Alder. This facility is built with new philosophies of youth reform.

Judge Warren Chan is appointed. He is the first Asian American judge appointed to King County Superior Court. He later is elected by his colleagues to the position of Presiding Judge.

Judge Nancy Ann Holman is appointed. She is the first woman to be appointed to King County Superior Court.

Litigants in King County Superior Court suffer years of delay for all cases, criminal and civil. They are not alone-this is a nationwide crisis for courts across the United States. Many organizations hold conferences and publish studies and papers starting in the 1970s and into the 1990s on the emerging crisis.

This crisis is a result of years of chronically underfunded court systems and the use of inadequate methods of case management across the U.S. During this time, the number of filed cases has greatly increased, as a result of increased use of civil litigation. There are greater numbers and more complex civil cases filed involving employment, class action, environmental, products liability, and medical malpractice.

The number of criminal filings and complexity of cases greater increases as well during this time. In the 1980s-1990s, the war on drugs, a ten-fold increase in reported sexual assaults, and a large increase in the homicide rate (the historical homicide rate record for Seattle is set in 1994; to be repeated again in 2023) all contribute to an unprecedented increase in the number of criminal filings, nationally and locally. There is also a greater awareness of certain crimes, such as sexual assault, domestic violence and elder abuse that increases case filings. New evidence such as DNA and video increases the complexity of cases. In 1973, Harborview’s Center for Sexual Assault and Traumatic Stress is founded in 1973; the King County Prosecutor’s Office founds one of the nation’s first Special Assault Units in the country, focusing on child abuse and domestic violence. Washington passes the Sentencing Reform Act in 1981, eliminating parole and taking much discretion away from judges; the nation’s first Sexually Violent Predator law in 1990; and the nation’s first Three Strikes law in 1993.

The King County Executive and Counsel agree to fund ten new Superior Court judge departments/positions, and five more by 1990.

The Seattle-King County Bar Association Delay Reduction Task Force begins its work. Judge Winsor appoints judicial members, and Presiding Judges Gerald Shellan and Charles Johnson would be in charge of the Court during its time. This remains one of the most significant access to justice projects, in the Court’s history. The National Center for State Courts will cite the changes at King County Superior Court as a national model for effective management to reduce the time to trial and increase access to justice.

The entire issue of the KCBA Bar Bulletin is devoted to a report about the work of the Task Force for criminal, civil and other areas.

The Bench/Bar Delay Reduction Task Force, chaired by Hon. Charles Johnson and M. Wayne Blair, publishes a technical report and plan authored by Judge Ann Ellington and Mary Wechsler. The Report includes standards of proposed reforms of various Departments and standards for resolution and reduction for backlog, and a new civil track for complex civil cases. Judge Sharon Armstrong is an important leader in implementing civil management reforms and Judge Terry Carroll chairs the criminal committee.

The Court, Executive and Council reach an impasse over funding for adding new judges. Norm Maleng mediates a resolution between the branches, and the result is Ordinance 8936, requiring a separate protocol agreement for adding additional judicial officers.

The Court has thirty-three judicial officers at this time.

The Court begins the Criminal and Civil Departments as a pilot and later permanent change in case assignment. The Civil Department pilots an “IC” civil project. Judges move from a general trial assignment from Presiding, where they might receive any type of case, to a model where civil cases are assigned to judge from the outset and certain judges in a Department try only civil cases. The Criminal Department assigns trials from the Chief Criminal Courtrooms in Seattle and Kent at the time of trial.

King County Superior Court begins Drug Court, its first treatment court, with Judge Ricardo Martinez.

All civil cases, including family law, are now assigned to Civil Department judges.

The County and Court opens a third courthouse and second jail in the city of Kent, the Maleng Regional Justice Center.

At the MRJC, the Court pilots a new family law department which would be later renamed Unified Family Court.

The Court and County begin addressing the overincarceration of juveniles and adults through two programs. Juvenile Justice Operational Master Plan (J-JOMP) spearheaded by then Presiding Judge Bobbe Bridge, leads to important juvenile court reforms and puts King County in the forefront of juvenile reform. The project becomes the model for a later county-wide project called the Adult Justice Operational Master Plan (A-JOMP).

Court votes to create a permanent Unified Family Court for family law. At the beginning, this Department is funded with assigned social workers for each court. Over time, these are defunded. UFC becomes the family law department. The Court has been able to retain funding for staff to assist unrepresented litigants in this Department, including Family Law Facilitators.

The Nisqually earthquake causes severe damage to the King County Courthouse. The County decides to retrofit and rebuild the courthouse over several years. At this time, the following are housed in the King County Superior Court: certain Departments of the Superior Court; the Seattle Division of the District Court; The Clerk’s Offices of both courts; the King County Law Library; the headquarters of King County Sheriff’s Office; the King County Council chambers and councilmember offices; King County TV; headquarters of the Department of Adult and Juvenile Detention; and the King County Prosecutor’s Office.

Jail overincarceration leads to the AJOMP project. Over an eight-year period, the AJOMP group, made up of judges, executive branch members, council members and lawyers, succeeds in reforming certain criminal processes and results in a dramatic reduction of adult pretrial incarceration. It was considered at the time as the most successful cross-branch reform project in King County history.

The Patricia Clark Children and Family Justice Center is opened at 12th and Alder. It is the fourth juvenile court building. It holds juvenile courts and dependency courts, the juvenile detention facility and school, replacing the former juvenile courthouse. For the first time, the new courthouse in this location also includes judges and commissioners in the Unified Family Court (family law) Department.

Covid-19 pandemic begins in the United States in Kirkland in January. In March, the Washington State Supreme Court orders a pause in all court proceedings and emergency procedures.

King County Superior Court works with Professors J. Scott Meschke and Marty Cohen from the University of Washington School of Public Health, the King County Bar Association and many other members of the bar and reopens by August. The County funds the installation of video conferencing equipment in every courtroom, and the Court leases the Meydenbauer Convention Center for courtrooms with social distancing. The widespread adoption of video technology transforms legal practice and King County Superior Court hearings and trials. Depositions, jury selection and jury trials are all held by video conferencing technology.

The Court had sixty-three judicial officers, fifty-four judges and nine commissioners. The Court is majority female.

During the pandemic, King County Superior Court holds more trials than any court system in the United States, including the entire states of California and New York.

The Court adopts a formal DEI policy which is later incorporated into the Five-Year Strategic Plan.