A tragic string of events

Suspect still loose

after stabbing

PABLO - An altercation at a residence in project 30 near the Pablo Bar last Wednesday night resulted in a stabbing that left one wounded and the suspect at large.

"The victim is going to pull through," Lake County Undersheriff Jay Doyle said.

Nathan Fisher is suspected of stabbing the 23-year-old victim around 5 p.m., who was then taken by ambulance to St. Luke Hospital in Ronan and stabilized before being flown to St. Patrick's Hospital in Missoula, Doyle said. LCSO Det. Dan Yonkin said Friday the victim was placed in the Intensive Care Unit at the hospital but his condition is improving.

Witnesses said the 23-year-old suspect took off in an older dark blue Crown Victoria after the alleged incident, possibly headed for Ronan. As of press time, Fisher had yet to be apprehended. Doyle said it is "hard to say" if Fisher remained in the county following the alleged altercation.

"The suspect is out and about and we are going to be obtaining a warrant for his arrest," Doyle said.

Witnesses said they believed Fisher may have a 9mm handgun and Lake County Dispatch warned law enforcement that the suspect is an "officer caution" for drugs and weapons.

"Any time there are weapons, we put that out there for officer safety reasons," Doyle said, noting this is not the first time Fisher has been a suspect in a stabbing investigation.

Officers detained Fisher after a Jan. 28 altercation outside the South Shore lounge. Fisher allegedly stabbed the victim, Cody McKay, 17 times in the parking lot of the Polson bar.

Fisher was released from the Lake County Jail on his own recognizance after a mistrial in late May in Judge C.B. McNeil's District Courtroom. He faced two felony charges of assault with a weapon and felony aggravated assault stemming from the January incident. He allegedly used a 3-inch knife to stab McKay. Deputy county attorney Cory Allen has refiled charges in the original case, which is set for another trial on Oct. 4.

A warrant for Fisher's arrest was filed with Lake County District Court ordering Fisher held on $100,000 bond. Conditions of his release from the previous charges hadn't changed and Allen alleges that Fisher violated the terms by possessing a weapon and allegedly committing a crime.

Anyone with information about Nathan Fisher's whereabouts are encouraged to contact Crimestoppers at 883-7309. Doyle said information leading to his capture could result in a reward and callers may remain anonymous. Citizens can also contact Lake County Dispatch at 883-7301 with any information or tips.

-Reporter Sasha Goldstein

Explosion in Pablo

PABLO - A severed electrical line sent one man to the hospital and left much of Pablo without power during a Thursday morning construction accident.

Daryl Ardis, part of a crew digging fence post holes on the campus of the Salish Kootenai College between the nursing building and Two Eagle River school, apparently struck a key electrical line around 10:45 a.m., Ronan Fire Department volunteer Dan Miller said.

"They had dug the hole with a Bobcat and [Ardis] was cleaning it out with a spud bar," Miller said. "They had the line located but thought it was over more. [The victim] apparently thought it was a rock or root or something."

The force of the explosion knocked Ardis off his feet. He was seen walking around and talking shortly after but suffered scorching burns to his face and ended up extremely lucky, Miller said.

"It's good that it knocked him back because if he continued to be in contact with the line he could have been electrocuted and burned a lot worse, also," Miller said.

A Ronan ambulance transported the 38-year-old victim to a hospital after stabilizing him on a backboard. He was subsequently flown to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle as a precaution.

The severed line, which was considered "major," left the entire east side of U.S. Highway 93 in Pablo without power including the traffic lights at the intersections of Division St. and Pablo West/Clairmont Rd. Tribal officer Joe Plant was on scene directing traffic at Division St. and Hwy. 93. Mission Valley Power was on scene attempting to fix the outage.

Witnesses said they didn't see what happened but certainly felt it.

"I heard a big boom, like an artillery shell going off," Jesse Cutfinger, an employee at Two Eagle River school, said. "It was loud enough to hear from that far away."

Cody Blaine was sitting in radiology class when the incident occurred.

"We were inside and it was a big ‘woosh' sound as the power went out," he said.

Miller said all things considered, the accident could have been much worse.

"I've heard big lines be cut before and it sounds like a stick of dynamite going off," he said.

-Reporter Sasha Goldstein

Boys drown in canal

ST. IGNATIUS - Two young brothers died Saturday evening after drowning in an irrigation canal near St. Ignatius.

The victims were identified as Dennis, 8, and Harry Beauchamp, 15, both of Wolf Point.

According to the Lake County Sheriff's Office, Dennis slipped on a footbridge around 7:30 p.m. and toppled into an irrigation ditch. Harry jumped in to rescue Dennis, who did not know how to swim, but both boys were swept away by the swift current. Tribal officers and Lake County sheriff's deputies responded and located the boys in the canal. They were transported to St. Luke Hospital in Ronan before being pronounced dead around 10:30 p.m.

The brothers were in town visiting relatives and camping with their parents nearby.

The drowning deaths came nine days prior to the first year anniversary of the drowning of Montana Highway Patrol Trooper Chris Hoyt in Pump Canal, an irrigation ditch south of Polson. Hoyt jumped in to the canal on Aug. 23, 2009, and drowned trying to save his dog. The dog survived the incident.

Gordon Wind, project manager for the Flathead Indian Irrigation Project, said canals and irrigation ditches are extremely dangerous and no place to be swimming.

"The water is cold, the current can sometimes be swift and it's not always easy to exit a canal in a swift flowing channel," he said.

The incident occurred below Tabor Dam, Wind said, in a concrete lined section of canal. Wind said the FIIP turned off the canal to help rescuers recover the victims.

"When you're in [such a canal], it's a dangerous place," he said. "The water carries along quite rapidly and it's not so easy to stop or get out. It's a tragic, sad thing."

-Reporter Sasha Goldstein

Lakeside man

survives fall

ST. IGNATIUS - Twenty-one-year-old Evan Kreps is alive and relatively well after falling some 120 feet on a mountain Saturday afternoon.

Kreps, from Lakeside, and Kalispell resident Tyler Schaefer, 22, were hiking and bushwhacking through forest on Kakashe Mountain near Mission Falls east of St. Ignatius about 2 p.m. Saturday when Kreps slipped and fell.

It was a pretty crazy ordeal, Schaefer said Sunday after standing watch over a friend he's known for only three months.

Schaefer, who relocated to the area from Palm Springs, Calif., for the summer, was hiking behind Kreps when he heard "ghastly death screams. I threw off my pack and ran to him," Schaefer said.

Kreps had fallen over rocks in 15-foot increments several times before a final fall Schaefer estimates at 40 feet.

Kreps had gashes in his head, forearm and leg.

"He's lucky he didn't hit a tree" on the way down, Schaefer said. Kreps "was bouncing off rocks. It's amazing he didn't break any bones."

The skin on Kreps' forearm was completely gone, down to the muscle.

Schaefer said he was afraid Kreps had a skull fracture, but that fear was unfounded. Schaefer stabilized his friend's wounds and tied his own T-shirt around Kreps' arm.

After asking him questions - who is the president? What day is it? What month is it? - that Kreps answered correctly, the two men walked about five minutes to a flatter area.

Schaefer called Kreps' parents, who called Lake County Search and Rescue; then Schaefer called 911. It was seven and one-half hours later, 9:30 p.m., when two paramedics showed up after hiking through what Schaefer called "extreme terrain."

It was dark by then, but Schaefer had started a fire with the one paper match he had with him and some tree moss, tree sap and toilet paper.

Schaefer lit some Roman candles he had with him. They weren't seen from the air but were instead heard by rescuers. The candles' sounds helped them find the two men.

The rescuers had been hiking in the wrong direction, Schaefer said, and weren't able to locate the men through the Global Positioning System on Schaefer's phone due to their remote location.

While they waited for help, Schaefer gave his friend the rest of their water because he had lost a lot of blood. Kreps was cold.

Schaefer didn't let his friend go to sleep, but he finally went to sleep himself sometime after the first two rescuers arrived.

"When I woke up there were 22" rescuers, Schaefer said, including members of Lake County Search and Rescue, a local fire department and a ranger from the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes.

The men set up camp at the high elevation. Food, water and coffee were dropped into the camp Sunday morning, and the men cleared trees so that a helicopter could land. Kreps was evacuated by helicopter around noon Sunday and transported to St. Luke's Community Hospital in Ronan, where he was treated and released.

Schaefer estimated Kreps had 10 stitches in his leg and six in his head, but wasn't sure about the forearm.

"They had to scrub the dirt out of his wound," Schaefer said, describing it as "road rash" from the fall.

Schaefer said he made sure he shook the hand of everyone at the camp, which will be used for future helicopter rescues.

"I was worried he wasn't going to make it out alive with me," Schaefer said. "Thank God I stayed calm. He's going to be completely fine."

-Caleb Soptelean/Daily Inter Lake