Jurors to hear of man's flight

SANDPOINT — First District Judge Barbara Buchanan ruled on Friday that Stephen Robert Reiling’s alleged escape to Hawaii while awaiting trial on lewd conduct charges will be used against him when he is tried.

Bonner County Prosecutor Louis Marshall moved for a court order that evidence relating to his flight from prosecution be admissible when Reiling is tried later this month.

Marshall argued Reiling’s runner was a “quintessential example of flight from prosecution.”

“By any objective measure, these facts create a reasonable inference that the defendant fled from prosecution because he was conscious of his own guilt,” Marshall said in the motion.

Marshall added that it is unlikely that Reiling has a plausible explanation for his disappearing act.

Reiling’s counsel, Gary Amendola, sidestepped an explanation for his client’s disappearance and argued that evidence of Reiling’s disappearance is irrelevant and its admission would create unfair prejudice that could confuse jurors, according to court documents. Amendola further argued that the state presented no evidence that Reiling had indeed fled in order to avoid being prosecuted.

The state and the defense argued the motion in court on Friday.

Buchanan ruled that the probative value of the evidence outweighed the prejudicial effect, court records indicate. The lack of explanation for Reiling’s failure to appear at trial could be material to his consciousness of guilt, Buchanan added.

Reiling, 57, was a no-show at the start of his trial in 2012 on allegations that he fondled the genitals of a girl in 2003, when she was between the ages of 8 and 9. The charges did not surface until 2011.

Reiling was found living under an assumed name in February in Hilo, Hawaii. He was accused of sexually assaulting an ex-girlfriend and tracked to a coffee shop. Reiling identified himself as Ken Starr, but a fingerprint analysis revealed his true identity. He was charged with bail jumping after spending nearly four years on the lam.

Reiling pleaded not guilty to the lewd conduct charges. At the time of his disappearance, Reiling’s friends said he fled Idaho because he did not believe he would receive a fair trial due to his unconventional sociopolitical beliefs.

Reiling is being held at the Bonner County Jail in lieu of $1 million bail. His four-day trial is set to start on July 12.