Local man arrested on assault, battery charges

A Bonner County man has been arrested on a handful of charges, including domestic aggravated assault and domestic battery, after Bonner County deputies responded to an Athol house in the early hours of Monday, April 24.

Jimmy Richard, 61, was arrested for domestic aggravated assault, attempted strangling, false imprisonment and domestic battery. Because this is his first Bonner County offense, his bail is set at $40,000.

According to court documents, the alleged victim called police upon escaping from her house claiming Richard held her at gunpoint, refusing to let her leave the house. The individual said Richard had been acting weird since Friday, claiming that she no longer loved him and accused her of cheating.

In a witness statement, the individual claimed she was awoken around 1 a.m. Monday to find Richard standing over her, again accusing her of no longer loving him. When she tried to get up, court documents allege the man shoved her back onto the bed, pinning her arms down and eventually wrapping his hand around her neck to prevent her from crying for help.

“When she struggled to get free, she saw [Richard] had a gun in his hand, pointed at her head,” deputies testified in the probable cause affidavit.

After repeatedly begging to be let go, the woman told deputies that Richard said multiple times that “she and him would not be leaving the room,” documents said, making the alleged victim believe that she would be part of a murder-suicide.

Eventually, she told deputies that she was allowed to get up and sit at the end of the bed but was not allowed to leave her bedroom, court records show. While court records did not indicate how the individual was eventually able to leave the house, she immediately ran to a neighbor’s residence and called the sheriff’s office from there, according to the documents.

Richard’s preliminary hearing date is set for May 5.