** and Politics.

I know that a local judge cheated on his first wife during their marriage, then also cheated on his second wife by having an emotional affair with a woman more than 25 years younger...because that woman was me. It happened 5 years ago. I was 25, young and stupid... and he was 52. The same age as my father.

I was the property manager of the office space he rented, and ran the front office, which was a communally shared office that included him. His office was right next to my desk, so he would come out and flirt with me every day. At first I was flattered by the attention, but it soon turned into him taking me out to lunch, buying me gifts whenever he went on trips, and eventually even running errands together and finding many excuses to stay into the late hours of the evening, talking to one another at the office.

I knew it was getting too dangerous when we were ending up at his house when his wife wasn't home. The last straw was when I went with him to be a notary on his sister-in-law's last will (she was dying of cancer) and he came on to me in the car, sitting in the driveway of her house... his wife's sister's house. I pushed him away from me and within two weeks, I'd given my notice to my employer. It was so wrong.

At the that time, he was a lawyer and part-time small town municipal judge, but 3 years ago he was elected to a special judicial position in the city I live in. Every time I see an article of a case he is getting notoriety for presiding over, it makes me sick. And when I've seen his wife at the grocery store, I almost want to tell her what kind of man she's married to. And to tell her I'm sorry for what I'd done.

I'm fairly certain that after I left, he went on to have a full-blown affair with another woman in the office. And he's now a sitting judge, presiding over criminal cases. I wish I could have said something to stop him from getting that position without ruining my reputation, but it's not possible. I'm married and have a family now.

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