Trial of Green Beret and wife begins Tuesday in Cd'A
By RALPH BARTHOLDT
Staff Writer
COEUR d’ALENE — On the first day of trial next week, a Coeur d’Alene judge will decide if an expert witness will testify for prosecutors who seek to show that husband and wife Lindsay and Harrison McLean battered patrol officers during an incident last summer at Kootenai Health.
The McLeans are accused of felony battery on police after a fracas last August resulted in their arrest in the emergency room of Kootenai Health as the couple sought treatment for Harrison McLean, a U.S. Army Green Beret and National Guardsman who was suffering stomach pain.
Police accused Lindsay McLean of driving drunk to the hospital and tried to arrest her, when Harrison lunged at an officer who had grabbed Lindsay’s arm and struggled with the woman. Lindsay’s dress was lifted, exposing her buttocks, as the officer and Lindsay fell onto a row of waiting room chairs.
The incident was recorded on surveillance videos and police body cameras. Because the McLeans refused a settlement offer, a three-day trial was scheduled beginning Tuesday.
Police accuse the couple of fighting with them as they resisted being arrested, but the McLeans argue that police used undue force in their attempt to arrest Lindsay McLean.
Prosecutors want to show jurors that the force used by officers was necessary.
Before testimony begins Tuesday, District Judge Cynthia K.C. Meyer will decide whether the state is allowed to call Coeur d’Alene Chief of Police Lee White as an expert witness to explain use of force to jurors.
Deputy prosecutor Art Verharen argued in a brief that jurors do not understand reasonable force used by police.
“When the question of what force is reasonable for a law enforcement officer to use in a given situation … it must be viewed through the lens of what a reasonable law enforcement officer would do at the time,” according to the brief. “Expert testimony regarding what is reasonable in this situation is admissible.”
The case, which was supposed to go to trial months ago, was postponed after it received a lot of publicity from news outlets.
Meyer ordered the defendants and their attorneys to refrain from talking to media and the trial was reset. The judge has prohibited testimony regarding Harrison Mclean’s military record, and an earlier motion to change the trial’s venue was withdrawn by prosecutors.
The couple, who own a Coeur d’Alene home inspection business, were indicted in September and have denied wrongdoing.
The trial begins at 9 a.m. Tuesday at the Kootenai County Justice Building.