Trial continues for man accused of killing mother

COEUR d'ALENE — People close to the late Susan Stratton testified Thursday that she was making plans to sell property in Spirit Lake and leave Idaho in the weeks before someone entered her home and brutally attacked her.

Susan Stratton's son, Coeur d'Alene resident Neil Stratton, 53, is on trial for allegedly beating her in September 2025 and inflicting the injuries that led to her death three weeks later. He's charged with first-degree murder, burglary and destruction of evidence, all felonies, in connection with his 77-year-old mother's death.

Diane Rippee, Susan Stratton's daughter and Neil Stratton's sister, took the stand Thursday to describe the complicated family dynamics at play before the attack.

Rippee said she and her mother bought a home together in Chattaroy, Wash., an unincorporated community in Spokane County, intending for Susan Stratton to spend the rest of her life there with her daughter's family. Rippee and her husband took over the mortgage in 2016, around the same time that Susan Stratton purchased 40 acres in Spirit Lake. She later sold 20 acres for about $500,000.

Also in 2016, Neil Stratton moved into the Chattaroy home. Rippee said her brother was working at the time but didn't contribute financially.

"It was tense," she said.

After about six months, Rippee said, her brother moved to the Spirit Lake property and lived in a container on the undeveloped land until Susan Stratton bought an RV for him to live in. He continued to visit the Chattaroy home several times a week, eating and washing his clothes there.

"I felt like we were being taken advantage of," Rippee said.

Rippee said she decided to sell the home in 2022, after Susan Stratton made it clear she would continue to have her son over to the house. The sale fractured the mother-daughter relationship.

"She wanted Chattaroy to be her last home," Rippee said. "She made a statement to me that I had screwed her by selling the property."

While Rippee's family moved to Missouri in 2023, Susan Stratton lived for a time in a travel trailer on the Spirit Lake property. Neil Stratton found a rental home in Coeur d'Alene, where he moved with his mother.

Rippee said her relationship with her mother was renewed in early September 2025, when they had lunch together while Rippee was visiting Spokane.

"She told me she was considering selling part of the Idaho property and moving to Missouri," she said. "She was going to buy a small home near us so she could live out her life."

It never came to pass. On Sept. 22, a police officer came to Rippee's home in Missouri and informed her that her mother was in the ICU at Kootenai Health.

After arriving in Idaho, Rippee said she learned that an unknown assailant had attacked her mother at home late at night on Sept. 17 or in the early hours of Sept. 18.

Susan Stratton never regained consciousness after the attack. She was admitted to hospice care Sept. 30 and died Oct. 3.

Family visited every day, including Neil Stratton.

"He said it's possible one of the contractors he was working with at the Spirit Lake property (attacked Susan Stratton)," Rippee told jurors.

At the time, police were investigating Neil Stratton's possible involvement in the crime. Defense counsel played an audio recording of a police officer explaining to Rippee that her brother was a suspect, which she denied.

"He physically did not do this," Rippee said in the recording. "He idolized that woman."

Rippee said Thursday that she no longer believes that. She testified that she filed a lawsuit under Idaho's slayer statute, which prevents any person who willfully and unlawfully kills another from inheriting or profiting from the victim's estate. Neil Stratton was the beneficiary of his mother's will.

"I did not want him to have the financial backing to make this go away," she said.

Linda Jordan testified that she was friends with Susan Stratton. The pair met at Real Life Ministries in Coeur d'Alene and Susan Stratton attended Jordan's weekly Bible study at her home.

"She was looking forward to going back to the Midwest, where her daughter was," Jordan said. "She anticipated that they would have to sell some of the property."

Jordan said she reached Neil Stratton by phone after his mother missed two Bible study sessions in a row. That was when she learned her friend had been attacked.

"Out of the blue and with a very angry voice, he said he did this to her," Jordan testified.

Neil Stratton called 911 the afternoon of Sept. 18, telling the operator he had returned home after staying overnight in Spirit Lake to find the home "ransacked" and his mother injured.

"I need paramedics," he said in the recorded call. "She's bleeding."

Body camera footage played in court showed the scene Coeur d'Alene police officers found when they entered the home in the 1100 block of East Skyline Drive where the Strattons lived.

The footage showed Susan Stratton on the bedroom floor, blood visible on her body and on the carpet. She made gurgling sounds with each breath and stirred slightly but didn't respond to police or medical personnel.

Colton Grytness, a detective with the Coeur d'Alene Police Department, said the home didn't appear "ransacked," as Neil Stratton had described. Boxes sat on the floor of Neil Stratton's bedroom, but the cupboards and drawers were closed and didn't look like anyone had gone through them.

"I picture (ransacked) as being in complete disarray," he said. "The room did not appear like that to me."