Mugshot of Allen Swadley – Photo courtesy of KTUV Fox News
On Feb. 19, 2026, before midnight, police pulled over and arrested former FHS athletic trainer Allen Swadley, who is now the main suspect of a double homicide in Pleasanton. He is currently being held in the Santa Rita Jail. He has already made a court appearance, where he was charged with two felony counts of murder, special circumstances and other allegations. These charges were due to the alleged manner in which the crime was committed, which indicates premeditation and sophistication, rather than an irrational, spur-of-the-moment decision.
Swadley became the athletic trainer at FHS in 2023, then left in 2025 to join Stanford’s Sports Medicine Care Team as an athletic trainer. During his time at FHS, he worked with many students every day, focusing on their health and recovery during various sports seasons. Sudents viewed him as caring and helpful, so this information came as a shock to the entire FHS population.
FHS junior and girls varsity soccer player Ana Mejia frequently visited Swadley with various injuries throughout her sophomore season. She, like many others, was in utter shock at hearing the news.
“Honestly, at first, I didn’t believe it,” Mejia said. “I was very shocked. Just not something I expected to hear.”
Mejia’s sophomore year season was cut short when she got seriously injured, fracturing her shoulder and having to recover for many months before coming back to the field. This led to many visits to the former athletic trainer.
“He was our athletic trainer, and since I was on the girls soccer team, you know, any injuries, I would talk to him,” Mejia said. “After one of my serious injuries, he helped me a lot with recovery. I had a lot of interactions with him for paperwork for my injury and the incident.”
The crime took place on Feb. 18, at around 10 a.m., with the victims being identified as 67-year-old Lori Simonds and her son, 28-year-old Evan James Simonds. The victims were allegedly the mother and brother of Swadley’s ex-girlfriend, Melissa Simonds. Melissa was reportedly at work when the murders took place, according to Pleasanton Weekly. After he was arrested, Swadley admitted to being at the victims’ house at the time of the murders, according to an interview conducted by Pleasanton Police Department Detective Nickolas Skaggs under Miranda.
According to the detective’s report, the police department received a 911 call on Feb. 18, coming from a pool cleaner who was working at the Simonds home at the time of the killings. He reported hearing four gunshots followed by a woman’s scream, and then two more gunshots. Six minutes after the call, officers responded to the scene and found the two bodies, but no firearms were located. When police approached Melissa Simonds, asking her if she knew anyone who would want to harm her family, she pointed them in the direction of Swadley. She told them that he was the only person she knew who owned firearms and knew where the hidden key of their home was, since he would often stay overnight at the residence until the two reportedly split in late December.
The police checked for vehicles registered under Swadley’s name and were able to locate his car with automated license plate reader cameras. These same cameras revealed he was driving near the area about an hour before the shootings, and also allowed them to find his car on the road and conduct an arrest the next day.
Upon arrest, police located several firearms in his vehicle and residence, though it is unclear yet if any of them have been used to commit the crime. Further tests will be run to determine whether they were discharged or not, and if they fit the timeline of the case.
If Swadley is convicted, he will be facing a lengthy prison sentence with no possibility of parole, and many charges to his name. This will include two first-degree murder charges if the prosecution can prove that there was, in fact, a premeditated nature to the crime. According to the Alameda County Inmate Locator, his most recent court appearance was a plea hearing on Monday.
A GoFundMe Campaign set up for Melissa Simonds, the lone survivor of the family, was organized by a friend of the family. It was posted just one day after the murders took place, and it has already raised approximately 83 thousand dollars and is still actively accepting donations. This fundraiser can be found on gofundme.com under the title “Support for Melissa After Tragic Loss.” If interested please visit this link: https://www.gofundme.com/f/bbgq4-support-for-melissa-after-tragic-loss. It was created to help cover funeral expenses and other costs.
Students at FHS have continued to express immense shock following the case and emerging details. FHS athletes, especially, were confused and in disbelief after seeing him daily and working so closely with him on recovery.
“I was in shock, because I knew him enough to have an opinion about him,” an anonymous FHS football player said. “I was just in shock that he could do that.”
“Allen, honestly, I was surprised,” FHS girls varsity softball player Jiyah Caban said. “He seemed really nice. I really did not expect that.”
Some students expressed feeling stressed about working so closely with faculty members in the future. This situation has left some students feeling uneasy about placing trust in adults at school, causing them to question the sense of safety and familiarity they once felt with faculty members.
“You can’t trust anyone because you don’t know the real side of them,” Caban said. “This is like how it was [four years ago] when my old softball coach got arrested too.”
“It definitively gives me a second thought about people, because like I said, this isn’t something I expected,” Mejia said. “Now I’m thinking a little bit more about the people I’m interacting with.”
During his time here, Swadley also taught several kinesiology classes and ran the sports medicine program. Several students participated in sports med, spending multiple hours with him daily, even coming in to see him during brunch, lunch and after school, practicing and applying the skills he taught them.
“Being a part of sports med was a really fun and enlightening experience for me,” FHS senior and sports med program participant Yusra Rahmani said in a call interview. “I learned a lot in terms of just moving fast and adjusting to different environments and paces, as well as learning a lot about terminology and medicine and the sports industry. My sports med students and I would go in and see him during brunch or lunch, just to check on him in the nurse’s office. But most of our time we would spend two, three hours after school with him, [we would] be able to practice on the different athletes that would come in court and ask questions.”
Although most FHS students and athletes only knew him on a surface level, sports med students had a more personal relationship with him, due to all the time they spent talking to him.
“I’ve always thought he was a very blunt and forthcoming type of guy, I thought he was like any other guy in the sports industry,” Rahmani said. “When I heard the news, I was like, what in the actual hell? And I remember texting the other students, and we were all like ‘what?’”
Just like most students, Rahmani will now approach interactions and connections with people differently, being more vigilant.
“I think it will change how I see men in male dominated fields, like the sports industry,” Rahmani said. “It is a very toxic place to be a part of. I didn’t see it then, but I see it now.”
With the case still being under investigation and new details emerging daily, it is unclear what sentence Swadley will face and how long he will remain behind bars. If he is found to be guilty of two first degree murders, he will likely be serving two life sentences. In the state of California, this means serving a minimum of 50 years before becoming eligible for parole.
