Monday, December 15, 2025
53.0°F

Isenberg's daughter charged with injury to a child

Ralph Bartholdt Staff Writer | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 7 years, 5 months AGO
by Ralph Bartholdt Staff Writer
| July 14, 2018 1:00 AM

COEUR d’ALENE — The daughter of Lori Isenberg was arrested on a warrant Thursday and charged with injury to a child, a misdemeanor.

Isenberg, whose whereabouts are not known, is wanted on a $500,000 warrant for a felony charge of grand theft, and she is under investigation for her role in the death of her husband, Larry, whose body was found floating in Lake Coeur d’Alene last spring.

It is the second time Isenberg’s daughter, April E. Barnes, 42, has been charged with injury to a child. The first time, two years ago, Barnes was charged with two counts of child injury that were dismissed. The most recent charge stems from an incident in May, but Barnes failed to appear in court and a warrant was issued.

“Here we are, two years later, the same deplorable conditions,” city prosecutor Wesley J. Somerton told the court Friday at Barnes’s first appearance.

Police said Barnes’s residence, where she lived with her two children and an 8-month-old child, was in disarray and unclean.

“There was garbage all over the floor,” of the kitchen, according a police report. “There was garbage on all the counters, dirty dishes stacked so high I could barely see the sink … old food and a white powder substance all over the kitchen.”

The house, in the 600 block of Hattie Avenue, is owned by the city of Coeur d’Alene and the rental is handled by the North Idaho Housing Coalition, the nonprofit agency from which Lori Isenberg is alleged to have embezzled more than a half million dollars.

The coalition assists families with affordable housing in Idaho’s five northern counties.

While she worked for the Housing Coalition, Isenberg hired April Barnes to work as her assistant. Board members were unaware April was Isenberg’s daughter.

After her arrest in February, Isenberg, 64, posted bond and failed to appear for her court hearings. She has been under investigation for grand theft since then, and recently, court records show, she is also the subject of a homicide investigation.

Larry Isenberg, 68, was last seen by friends and neighbors a day before he went on a morning boat ride with his wife. His body was found in March floating near shore in Windy Bay.

Barnes was released on her own recognizance and ordered to appear at all her hearings.

ARTICLES BY RALPH BARTHOLDT STAFF WRITER

Traffic fatalities on Super Bowl Sundays? Nope
February 1, 2020 midnight

Traffic fatalities on Super Bowl Sundays? Nope

Super Bowl Sunday may invoke images of tailgating and revelry that exceed the merriment of other annual sporting events, but local law enforcement aren’t kicking off special patrols to tackle errant — or intoxicated — drivers.

Isenberg: No plea at murder hearing
March 4, 2020 midnight

Isenberg: No plea at murder hearing

Her shackles jangling, Lori Isenberg walked in single file with other inmates into a downtown Coeur d’Alene courtroom Tuesday afternoon, wearing red, high-security jail pajamas and shower shoes.

Police: Man sought in assault case
March 6, 2020 12:15 a.m.

Police: Man sought in assault case

The 53-year-old man who likely died during a standoff with police this week in Post Falls was wanted for failing to appear at his sentencing hearing after being convicted for assaulting a group of Jehovah’s Witnesses.