Hearing today in crash case

SANDPOINT — A preliminary hearing for a woman accused of running over a fallen motorcyclist in a construction zone is set for today.

Brianna Lucille Knapp can either waive the hearing and be bound over to stand trial in 1st District Court or compel the state to present enough evidence to persuade a judge that a trial is justified.

The hearing could also be continued to another date, as happened last month.

Knapp is charged with leaving the scene of an injury accident, a felony. She is free on her own recognizance while the case is pending.

It has also been revealed that a second criminal charge filed against Knapp after the deadly collision has no connection to the incident.

The second charge was filed eight days after the July 25 crash, but remained sealed until she made an initial court appearance on Aug. 31. The second charge alleges she wrote a $475 check last year to a Clark Fork business on a closed account, a felony.

A preliminary hearing on that charge is set for Sept. 19.

Knapp is accused of leaving the scene of a Highway 200 crash in which motorcyclist Kurt P. Henson, 47, was killed. A passenger on Henson’s Harley-Davidson, 43-year-old Kimberly Lenox, was injured in the crash but survived.

Idaho State Police said Henson was westbound when he hit an abrupt lane edge in a construction zone near Clark Fork and crashed. Knapp, state police said, was also westbound and crashed into the Harley and Henson moments later.

Knapp drove about a half a mile before abandoning her damaged pickup truck by the side of the highway and catching a ride back to Clark Fork with a motorist.

Knapp, who reported to the Bonner County Sheriff’s Office the day after the crash to be interviewed by state police, recalled hitting nothing substantial, although ISP crash investigators said it should have been obvious that Knapp had been involved in a serious collision, according to court documents.