Lack of charges against nonprofit director gets second look

Liberty Lake police Chief Brian Asmus has asked prosecutors to review their decision not to file criminal charges against Jon Schlenske, executive director of a substance abuse treatment center.

Asmus says Schlenske’s alleged actions on the night of Sept. 6 clearly meet the elements required by law for criminal charges.

Two Liberty Lake officers arrested Schlenske on suspicion of felony unlawful imprisonment and misdemeanor assault. A woman claims Schlenske pinned her up against his car and restrained her while holding her hands above her head. Her statement was corroborated by a witness.

Schlenske leads Spokane Treatment and Recovery Services, formerly called Community Detox Services, a nonprofit organization that received more than $1.5 million in local government contracts to provide drug and alcohol treatment.

Spokane County prosecuting attorney Mark Lindsay said in court Monday that his office wouldn’t pursue charges against Schlenske, but did not say why.

Asmus said he called Spokane County Prosecutor Larry Haskell about the matter and was told prosecutors believed there wasn’t enough information to pursue charges in the probable cause affidavit prepared by police. The two-page affidavit relates the claim from the woman Schlenske is accused of assaulting.

“I don’t know for sure why they did that,” Asmus said of the decision not to file charges.

Asmus said Lindsay should have had copies of the full reports filed by the officers, not just the probable cause affidavit.

“As far as I know, we sent all that down,” Asmus said. “I don’t know what he (Lindsay) had and he didn’t have. If he did have everything, then yeah, that’s a bit frustrating.”

Asmus said he submitted all the reports to the prosecutor’s office again, as well as more than two hours of body camera footage from the officers involved in the arrest.

Haskell, who was on vacation last week, said he’s not certain why one of his prosecutors declined to file charges.

“I didn’t make the decision,” he said. “I wasn’t here.”

Haskell said he has reviewed the probable cause affidavit and police reports and planned to watch the body camera video Tuesday evening.

“I anticipate that I will ask for additional interviews to be conducted,” he said, which isn’t common in making a charging decision.

It’s his job to make sure he’s legally on solid ground in seeking charges, Haskell said. It’s also his job to consider potential defense arguments that could be made against the charges, he said.

“In every case I want to make sure we make the right decision,” he said. “It doesn’t have anything to do with an organization.”

Schlenske’s attorney, Chris Bugbee, said he was not aware that the prosecutor’s office was taking a second look at filing charges.

“I trust the prosecutor’s office to make an informed decision based on what they’ve seen and what they have,” he said. “I’m not worried at all because I don’t believe my client committed any crime, despite some unfortunate behavior.”

Unlawful_Imprisonment_1edited from The Spokesman-Review on Vimeo.

The body camera video shows that Schlenske was argumentative and repeatedly refused to comply with the commands of officers. While in the back of a police car on the way to jail, Schlenske repeatedly said he didn’t do anything and said he wanted to kill himself. He told the officer in an expletive-laced statement that the officer had no idea what Schlenske was “going to do to you.”

Once at the jail he became so unruly that corrections officers had to put him in a restraint chair, Asmus said.

Legally, police could have pursued a harassment charge against Schlenske because of recorded threats he made against a police officer. But the officer involved chose not to recommend that charge because such threats are common, Asmus said.

“Officers get that, especially from intoxicated folks,” he said.

Last week the board chairwoman of Spokane Treatment and Recovery Services said the board did not see the need to take any disciplinary action against Schlenske. “We have complete faith in Jon,” she said.