A man whose assault trial was delayed this week because not enough jurors could be found is now facing another criminal charge.
Michael McCreary, 53, who is believed to be a member of Sons of Scilence MC was charged Friday, Feb. 7, with tampering with witnesses and informants in proceedings, a class C felony. At bond hearing Friday afternoon, McCreary was ordered held on $100,000 bond on the new charge and multiple existing charges.
The new charge is related to an aggravated assault and conspiracy charge McCreary is facing from April 2019. In that case he was accused of attacking someone in exchange for $2,000 from another man, Earl Brewer.
Brewer was charged with a class C felony count of criminal conspiracy. The trials of both men are scheduled for Wednesday, Feb. 12.
McCreary repeatedly called one of the witnesses for the upcoming trial repeatedly on Wednesday, according to an affidavit of probable cause filed in Northwest District Court. In one conversation, the witness told McCreary that she had to testify against Brewer, but McCreary told her she did not have to.
Instead, he said, she should stick to the same story another witness would testify to, charging documents indicate. He told her that prosecutors would be upset but couldn’t do anything.
McCreary also told the witness that telling the same story as the other witness would mean she would prevail in a custody dispute, court records state. Throughout the call, McCreary referenced a recording another witness had.
“McCreary indicates that she needs to stick to the tape, and it’s going to come out, and she is going to look stupid if she does not stick to the tape,” investigators wrote in the probable cause affidavit.
In another call, McCreary told the witness that if she didn’t tell the story he was referring to, then damaging information about her past might be brought up in court.
This is the second time McCreary has been charged with tampering with witnesses. In September he was accused of having contact with a woman he was ordered to stay away from as a condition of his release on bond.
McCreary was supposed to go on trial Monday on a class C felony charge of aggravated assault. He was accused of attacking a security guard at the Grand Williston Hotel during a meeting of the Sons of Silence Motorcycle Club.
At a bond hearing Friday, Nathan Madden, assistant state’s attorney for Williams County, asked for bond to be set at $250,000. He told Johnson that this was the second tampering charge McCreary was facing.
“This seems to be a pattern of behavior by this defendant,” he said.
Donald Sauviac, a public defender representing McCreary, questioned Madden’s claims, though. He said he hadn’t been given a copy of the recording yet and said the charge was filed in retaliation.
Northwest District Judge Josh Rustad declared a mistrial in McCreary’s aggravated assault case Monday after not enough jurors showed up for the trial. A new trial is scheduled for March 30.
Sauviac asked to have the witness McCreary was accused of trying to influence testify at the bond hearing.
Northwest District Judge Ben Johnson said he would hear what the woman had to say about whether he should put a no contact order in place but he wouldn’t allow her to testify.
“That’s not what a bond hearing is for,” he said.
The woman told Johnson that she did not want a no-contact order. She said McCreary had not threatened her.
“We’ve been talking since before this all happened,” she said.
Johnson said he thought the $100,000 bond McCreary has been held on since January was appropriate to cover the new case, as well.
A preliminary hearing on the new charge is scheduled for March 4.
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Source: Williston Herald