After guilty verdict, Balbas goes on rant, threatens judge

A Columbia Falls man who once threatened to “shoot up” local churches and kill his ex-wife was convicted April 15 of felony criminal endangerment and felony intimidation after a jury trial in Flathead County District Court in front of Judge Danni Coffman.

Jurors deliberated a little over three hours in the case of Jacob Daniel Balbas, 35.

“I am going to give you the angel that throws you into the lake of fire a giant high five,” Balbas told his ex-wife in a text. “...I may even do it myself ... On June 8th, you and your family go into the lake of fire. There’s no way of stopping it, or anyone who gets in my way,” said Balbas in a text to his ex-wife which Deputy County Attorney Larissa Malloy read to the jury in closing arguments.

“This is intimidation,” Malloy said.

The intimidation charge was the result of death threats to Balbas’s ex-wife on Nov. 1, 2024. The felony criminal endangerment charge came from a high-speed chase in and around Columbia Falls the next day that ended near Proof Research. As police attempted to execute a search warrant at Balbas’s Columbia Falls home, they saw Balbas and he fled in a vehicle.

Inside Balbas’s home, police found what they described in reports as a “sniper’s nest.”

While it did not result in any charges, the finding was chilling.

“There was an AR15-style rifle lying next to a window, a 60-round, high-capacity magazine inserted into the weapon, and another 60-round magazine next to the rifle, both fully loaded. The blinds were drawn down, approximately six inches from being fully closed and the screen outside the window had been peeled back in the corner which would enable a shooter to put a barrel through the screen and rest the bipod on the sill of the window. The window directly overlooked the single driveway entrance onto the property. The safety on the rifle was positioned on fire,” the police report at the time stated. 

In addition, local clergy had contacted police and said that Balbas had threatened to “shoot up” churches.

Prosecutors noted that even Balbas’s own family members were concerned about him and whether it was safe for him to be around his own children, In addition, state Child Protective Services personnel who were investigating complaints were also concerned.

At one point, his ex-wife even had to hide in the Columbia Falls Library as she was afraid of Balbas and what he might do to her once he found out he would  lose partial custody of his children.

At one point, Balbas told his ex-wife she could “blow her head off now, or have her children taken from you ... tick-tock.”

He also said, “You can spend the rest of your days knowing I can find you and kill you myself. I hope you live in fear everyday.”

Defense attorney Keenan Gallagher argued that while Balbas’s texts could have been interpreted with clear intent, they did not qualify as intimidation. He claimed that context mattered.

Gallagher claimed that there was no history of violence between Balbas and his ex-wife. 

“He never hit her, slapped her; there’s never been a history of violence between Jacob and (her),” Gallagher claimed.

“There is a difference between angry text messages after an offense, versus angry text messages crafted for a specific outcome,” he added. 

He also claimed the high-speed chase also did not meet the threshold of criminal endangerment, though it was “bad behavior.”

But ultimately, the jury, which deliberated for about three hours, found Balbas guilty on both counts.

After he was found guilty Balbas went on a rant in the court, claiming the roles would be flipped and that Coffman and prosecutors would be damned to all eternity and the wrath of God was upon them now.

“Someday, I’ll be sitting in the place you’re sitting, looking down upon you,” Balbas said to Coffman at one point.

Coffman took the matter in stride and remanded Balbas to the Flathead County Detention Center.

Sentencing was set for 1:30 p.m. June 5.