PORT ANGELES — Harassment and fourth-degree domestic violence assault charges have been dismissed against a Port Angeles man after he completed a yearlong diversion program in Clallam County.
The charges against Andrew David Nilsson, 28, were dismissed Friday with prejudice, meaning he cannot be retried for the crimes, after he met all the requirements of the sentencing diversion program through Friendship Diversion Services, according to Clallam County Superior Court records.
The requirements included regularly reporting to diversion services staff and completing a chemical dependency treatment program.
Nilsson would have been found guilty of the harassment and fourth-degree domestic violence assault charges if he had not completed the diversion program requirements and would have served time in jail, according to Superior Court records.
Nilsson was assigned to the diversion program last April, county Chief Criminal Prosecuting Attorney John Troberg said then.
Conferred with defense
Troberg had said he developed the terms of the diversion agreement with Nilsson’s public defense attorney, Loren Oakley, after Nilsson’s alleged victim in the case refused to testify against him.
In October 2012, Troberg charged Nilsson with one count of harassment/threats to kill and one count each of second-degree assault/strangulation, unlawful imprisonment, harassment/threats to kill and fourth-degree assault, all of which are domestic violence-related.
Nilsson was accused of assaulting a woman several times in September 2012 in Port Angeles and threatening her friends with death.
Troberg said last April he reduced the charges to harassment and fourth-degree domestic assault in response to the alleged victim’s denial that any of what Nilsson was accused of ever took place.
Port Angeles police set out to arrest Nilsson in connection with the case in October 2012 but did not find him at his Eighth Street home.
Police did find at the home a small homemade explosive device. The State Patrol bomb squad disposed of it.
Nilsson was arrested in Bellflower, Calif., for investigation of unrelated charges in November 2012 and shipped back to Clallam County the last week of January.
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Reporter Jeremy Schwartz can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5074, or at jschwartz@peninsuladailynews.com.
