SANDPOINT — A Sagle man pleaded guilty Thursday to a battery charge authorities and witnesses say is connected to the shooting death of Elvin “Eli” Holt last year.

James Matthew Anderson entered the plea on the day his trial was scheduled to get under way in the magistrate division of 1st District Court. His sentencing on the misdemeanor charge is set for May 20.

He faces up to six months in jail and a $1,000 fine.

Anderson’s five-day jury trial on a charge of second-degree murder in connection with the Holt slaying is slated to start on July 13. He remains held at the Bonner County Jail with bail set at $200,000.

The charge to which Anderson pleaded dates back to Oct. 1, 2008, when he and another man allegedly attacked Justin Stuart Hines as he sat inside a parked vehicle outside Unicep Packaging in Sandpoint.

Witnesses told Sandpoint Police that Anderson, 29, entered the back seat of the vehicle and restrained Hines while Patrick Keith Eroso Ziarnick reached through the window and repeatedly punched Hines in the face and head.

Ziarnick, 30, pleaded guilty to the battery and was sentenced to 20 days in jail earlier this year.

At a preliminary hearing in the murder case, Anderson’s wife testified that Hines had allegedly been harassing Ziarnick’s wife.

Nearly two months after the blitz-style attack on Hines, Holt and his half brother turned up on Anderson’s doorstep to confront him about the beating. Holt was a close personal friend of Hines’.

The confrontation ended with Holt, also 30, dead of a gunshot wound to the head. Anderson reportedly told Bonner County Sheriff’s investigators he brandished the .44 magnum in an attempt to persuade the men to leave, but the weapon accidentally discharged.