Rep. Olson takes stand in own defense

State Representative Mark Olson broke down and cried many times Thursday on the witness stand, as he attempted to defend himself against charges of domestic assault. He also created an image of a man living in fear, struggling to quell a hostile spouse and hold a marriage together.

"I can't tell you how many times I went to bed thinking I'd have a knife in my back," Olson said at one point.

"But I was wrong to have that fear. God rebuked me, love thinketh no ill," he continued quoting a Biblical passage.

The knife was a reference to the time Heidi stabbed an antique china hutch in their bedroom, something she admitted doing because she was upset after a telephone argument with her husband. She also admitted cutting into the front cover of their wedding album with scissors and slicing up a photo of the two.

Mark Olson cried out in court as he clutched the wedding album, "That was ME. The dresser and this (album) represented ME to my wife."

At times the he became extremely animated as he quoted himself and wife Heidi, seeming to recapture the emotions he experienced during the episodes in question. Olson is accused of two misdemeanor counts of domestic assault, stemming from an incident at the couple's Big Lake home last November 12.

Contrary to Heidi's testimony on Wednesday, the long-time lawmaker testified that his wife was the one who became physical first the day he was arrested. In fact, he said she was the one who started most of confrontations that turned violent during their four-year marriage.

And yet he said he took the blame for all of the discord in the home, because as the head of the household or the "strong man of the home" he was ultimately responsible for keeping the peace. He said he failed in that capacity.

While Ms. Olson testified Wednesday that Olson threw her down to the ground three times on the Sunday in question, Mark Olson's version made it sound like more of a scuffle with both taking swings at one another in the back yard.

He told the court, "She came running at me in a fury, came running at me, right up to me. She was screaming 'Get off my property! Get off my property'."

"She was throwing herself at me, pushing on me."

Olson had just finished an argument with Heidi on his cell phone, and by the time he hung up on her he had pulled into the yard of the home. He said he resolved himself to go get a tape measure from the tool shed so he could take measurements of the back of the house for a planned room addition.

"She was pushing me with her hands. At that point I escalated it, tried to stop her. I put my hands on her shoulders and tried to put her on the ground."

Olson erupted into sobs and cried out, "I kept saying to myself 'Don't let go of her! Don't let go! Don't hurt her'!"

He continued crying, addressing the jury, "I didn't want to hurt her! I didn't want to hurt her. I just wanted it to stop! I wanted it to stop! There's nothing I could do any more."

Olson said the two had been in different marriage counseling programs, and he had been to various sessions and seminars, purchased books and videos designed to learn how to diffuse conflicts. And he was frustrated that, despite his best intentions, he found himself in the middle of another volatile exchange with his wife.

He continued quoting himself from that day, relating to the jury what he said to Heidi as he took her down to the ground.

"Why do you do this? Why do you treat me this way? Why do you provoke me so? What are you trying to do, drive me to burn the house down or something?"

The house burning reference was one of the few things both Heidi and Mark's testimony had in common. Later in the day Mark Olson also agreed with his wife's recollection that he said at one point, "I have nothing left to lose."

That comment caused Heidi to believe he was suicidal, she told jurors Wednesday, and to fear he would kill her and himself. But under questioning from his attorney, Jill Clark, Mr. Olson said that he was never suicidal that day and had no thoughts along those lines.

While Heidi had characterized the event on the 12th as a one-sided fight with Mark doing all the shoving, he recalled it differently.

"She kept thrashing at me, swinging at me. I was down and she tore my sweater. I went limp."

Olson testified that before he married Heidi the two of them agreed he would be the head of the household, but he felt it was a struggle at times trying to implement that agreement.

Olson said the two often argued about how to discipline Heidi's autistic son Shawn, who was 12 at the time of the alleged assault. Shawn is one of five children Heidi had with her first husband, champion snowmobile racer Darcy Ewing, who was killed in an accident about a year before she married his good friend Mark Olson.

Heidi testified earlier that it was an ongoing, three-day argument that led up to the events that landed Rep Olson in jail. Olson acknowledged that Heidi had "scolded" him for the way he dealt with Shawn, but the jury was left with two impressions of what had initiated that final breakdown in the relationship.

During Heidi's testimony she said she felt her husband had been too harsh with her kids in general, but this particular disagreement began because Mr. Olson overreacted to something Shawn did during a game of Monopoly. While Heidi was away taking a night class she said Olson became upset with Shawn for buying hotels at the wrong price and decided to correct him.

When asked Thursday whether that was inappropriate, Olson said, "No mam. I was just trying to explain to him the rules of the game."

Mark Olson said the three-day argument over Shawn had more to do with something he said took place two days earlier, in which he tried to correct Shawn for something that happened outdoors.

"Shawn came running in screaming I hate you, I'm gonna kill you'!"

In tears Olson explained that he sat there and took several hard blows from Shawn while keeping his cool. He said he felt it was a victory, especially when Shawn came back later to apologize according to Olson's account.

He thought Heidi would celebrate it as a major breakthrough with the child, but she didn't.

"She scolded me for letting Shawn do what he did, even though it was successful with Shawn repenting and apologizing for it."

When asked on cross-examination if he ever hit Shawn with a stick, Olson answered, "If you interpret spanking as 'hitting with a stick' then yes."

He elaborated, "It got to the point where nothing worked. I said 'We've got to try spanking' and she agreed. It worked! We had three days without any violence! It was euphoric."

But when asked what put led to a rugged final weekend together, Olson explained Heidi had also been confronting him mostly for putting off home projects that had been on hold during his campaign for re-election. Olson won an eighth term to the Minnesota House just five days before his arrest.

Much of his testimony Thursday involved his understanding of the roles of husband and wife in a Christian family. The reason his defense lawyer is focusing on that aspect of the relationship is to make a case that Sherburne County Sheriff's Office investigators misinterpreted Olson's statements when they interviewed him in jail.

One of those investigators re-read parts of the jailhouse interview transcript Thursday, including a passage that went as follows:

"I may regret this but the bottom line is I failed in self-control in response to a lot of pressure."

When asked by detectives that day, "Did she strike you at all prior to you putting her on the ground?" Olson replied, "No."

But he added, "In this entire relationship from the beginning, the physical always started with her."

His attorney, Jill Clark, asked him about the first years of their marriage and about the agreements they made prior to tying the knot July 19th, 2003. Clark asked Olson about the agreement he had with Heidi concerning the children and how the household would be run. Olson said, "The husband and wife are equal in the eyes of God, but they have different roles to play and the man has the headship."

He said during the first year of marriage there were a lot of blissful moments. Olson then he broke into tears as he described the progress made by Heidi's son Shawn who has autism.

"We are talking about a 9-year-old who was still in diapers, very violent and had a lot of rage."

By John Croman, KARE 11 News

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