ISP probing jail suicide

SANDPOINT -- Idaho State Police are investigating a reported suicide at the Bonner County Jail.

The body of inmate Mark Christopher Hatler, 45, was found during a routine bed check at 2 a.m. on Thursday, according to the Bonner County Sheriff's Office.

State police investigator Capt. Clark Rollins said preliminary autopsy results indicate Hatler died of asphyxiation consistent with a hanging. Hatler apparently hanged himself with a sheet tied to a bed, said Rollins.

"It's my understanding he wasn't on suicide watch. They had no inkling (Hatler was suicidal)," Rollins said.

Toxicology results are pending.

Hatler was booked into the jail on May 13 on charges of felony domestic violence, attempted strangulation and destruction of a telephonic device. He was being held on $250,000 bail and was awaiting a hearing to determine if he would be tried on the pending charges.

Court documents said Hatler attacked his girlfriend at a Sandpoint home in the pre-dawn hours of May 12. The 54-year-old woman told police that Hatler hit her, pinned her down and choked her into unconsciousness. She awoke after being hit again and fled from the Washington Avenue home, one of the police reports said.

Hatler was arrested at a Sandpoint lounge a few hours later. He reportedly told police he had not seen his girlfriend and had been staying at a motel for the previous two days.

Hatler listed his physical address in court documents as that of the Washington Avenue home and his mailing address as a post office box in Thompson Falls, Mont.

He was in court Wednesday for a preliminary hearing, but he was still without counsel and a public defender was appointed to represent him. The preliminary hearing was reset for May 31.

Hatler's death is the second suicide at the jail in the past eight months. Jeremy John Hamberg, 20, was found dead in one of the jail's protective custody cells on Sept. 27, 2005. Hamberg hanged himself by threading a sheet through a ventilation grate in the in the ceiling, an ISP report said.

Hatler hanged himself in one of the jail's general population pods, said Sheriff's Lt. Gary Johnston.