Man, 23, given deferred sentence for burglary

The Daily Inter Lake

A former Colorado resident convicted of stealing a gun from a Bigfork home and then using it to intimidate a Martin City woman has been given probation.

During a hearing Thursday in Flathead County District Court, Matthew Gene Rockwell, 23, was ordered to serve a six-year deferred sentence for burglary and a six-month suspended sentence for partner assault.

According to court documents, Rockwell stole the .45-caliber pistol from a home on Blenn Street in Bigfork. Rockwell used the stolen pistol in November 2008 to threaten the woman, then 26, at her Martin City home before driving her to Las Vegas, where she escaped from him five days later.

Prosecutors initially charged Rockwell with rape and kidnapping after the woman told authorities she had been taken against her will and had been raped repeatedly.

But the woman later changed her story, saying she had feared harm at Rockwell's hands only some of the time and that she had been involved in an on-again, off-again relationship with him.

The pair also stopped at several places, including a hotel and a relative's home, on their trip to Las Vegas, Deputy Flathead County Attorney Caleb E. Simpson said.

However, the woman did convince Rockwell to throw the gun into a creek in Clark County, Idaho, where it was later found by local authorities.

Rockwell, whose last known address was in Grand Junction, Colo., was arrested Dec. 1 at his mother's home in Bozeman, where she is a student.