KALISPELL – Flathead County authorities say an assault with a weapon charge, filed against a Marion man after a standoff with law enforcement officers in January, have been dropped because his wife won’t testify against him.
Thomas Lockwood was charged with assault with a weapon and criminal endangerment because two of his children who were left in a car during the 24-hour standoff showed signs of hypothermia.
The assault charge was dropped Thursday.
“The reason for that, the only reason for it, is that three months after the standoff his wife marched the kids in and basically told the sheriff’s office … in effect that they weren’t in fear for their lives or safety,” County Attorney Ed Corrigan said. “Had she remained consistent in that claim they were afraid for their lives or afraid of getting shot, we would have taken him to trial.”
Without the wife’s testimony, prosecutors were forced to drop the charge.
“It’s frustrating when the kids and their welfare take a back seat,” Corrigan said.
Police were called to the Lockwood residence on Jan. 6 when Lockwood allegedly locked his wife and three children out of the house. Lockwood’s wife said when she asked her husband to send out the children’s shoes and coats, a single gunshot was fired inside the house.
Lockwood’s wife, thinking he had committed suicide, put two of the couple’s three children in a nearby car. Prosecutors believe Lockwood came out of the house and started shooting, at which point his wife and one child fled a half mile in socks to the neighbor’s house, where they called authorities.
Law officers were not allowed to retrieve the two children from the car for about 18 hours.
The woman’s attorney, Lane K. Bennett, said his client “realized there was no threat to her or her children, although it was perceived by her that there was earlier.”
He said the family wants to get back together and put the incident behind them.
Lockwood did plead guilty Thursday to felony criminal endangerment and misdemeanor drunken driving for an Aug. 28, 2008 crash on U.S. 2 in Marion that injured his two daughters.
Court records say Lockwood picked up his children at their bus stop and hit a car in the parking lot before eventually running his car off the highway. He fled with his son and left the injured girls behind.
Because Lockwood pleaded guilty to the endangerment charge in connection with the DUI, the endangerment charge for the standoff was also dropped.
Corrigan said he will recommend that Lockwood receive a 10-year probationary sentence.