Kidnap suspect waives hearing

SANDPOINT — A Bonner County teen implicated in a retaliatory attack on a 20-year-old man apparently connected to a mysterious assault at Grouse Creek waived her right to a preliminary hearing on Wednesday.

Krystal Lynn Marie Hepinstall is scheduled to be arraigned in 1st District Court next month on a charge of aiding and abetting kidnapping in the second degree.

Hepinstall, 18, is accused of driving a vehicle into which a 20-year-old man was forced after being pummeled on Aug. 16 in Sandpoint. She is free on $25,000 bail while the case is pending.

The two suspects in that battery, Curtis Charles Allen Kluesner, 19, and Jonathan Dean Lewis, 21, remain at large. The cases against Kluesner and Lewis, who also uses the surname Huckabee, remain sealed, an indication they are wanted for arrest.

Hepinstall’s defense counsel, Serra Woods, advised Judge Justin Julian on Wednesday that the felony kidnapping charge could be supplanted with a misdemeanor charge, but she did not elaborate. Prosecutor Louis Marshall said on Thursday that his office is still contemplating what the lesser charge might be.

The trio is accused of setting upon the 20-year-old because they believed he knew who perpetrated a July 30 battery at Grouse Creek Falls, an incident which remains under investigation.

A 17-year-old was reportedly struck in the face with a rifle stock during a confrontation at a campsite. The clash provided much grist for the local rumor mill. There are wildly divergent accounts of the incident, but confirmed reports of what actually took place remain elusive.

Sheriff’s officials and Marshall have both said that the victims in that incident have not been cooperating with the investigation.