Lowrance back in jail, faces new felony charge

A Havre man who was just acquitted of a felony charge of criminal endangerment for shooting a gun inside the city limits is back in jail on a new felony charge.

James R. Lowrance, born in 1990, was in the Hill County jail this morning on $15,000 bond awaiting an arraignment Wednesday on felony charges of theft and forgery.

A jury in January at the end of a three-day trial in state District Court in Havre found Lowrance not guilty of a felony count of criminal endangerment and found him guilty of misdemeanor charges of shooting a gun inside city limits and negligent endangerment.

Lowrance was charged last year after he fired a pistol June 10 while on the 600 block of 3rd Street.

Lowrance and the man at whom he pointed the gun began arguing after Lowrance cursed at the man’s girlfriend, who had confronted yet another man, her upstairs neighbor, about that man hitting his own dog.

After the man said he doubted it was a real gun, Lowrance fired the gun to show it was real and loaded.

State District Judge Dan Boucher sentenced Lowrance Feb. 4 to one year in the county jail, with all but eight days suspended and credit for eight days served, and ordered him to pay a $25 fine on the charge of shooting a gun inside city limits. He also ordered Lowrance to pay $85 in court fees and charges for each offense.

Tuesday, the Hill County Attorney filed the new felony charges, alleging Lowrance between December and the end of January cashed 13 checks belonging to a 68-year-old Great Falls man totalling $1,550.

A court document says a representative of the Montana Department of Criminal Investigation contacted Havre police about an investigation into elder abuse involving checks cashed in Havre.

A caretaker for the Great Falls man said the man does not know who Lowrance is and that Lowrance was not authorized to possess or cash any of his checks.

Representatives of local businesses told officers that Lowrance had cashed the man’s checks and provided video of his doing so, the document says.

The document says a Havre officer interviewed Lowrance Feb. 4, the day he was sentenced on the other charges.

Lowrance told the officer that he had never met nor talked to the Great Falls man. The checks began arriving in the mail in envelopes with no return address, and he cashed them, the document says he told the officer.

Lowrance told the officer he does not and never had possession of the man’s blank checks or checkbooks.

The officer that day obtained a warrant to search Lowrance’s residence and found a box of checks with four books of checks belonging to the Great Falls man, the document says.