Man leaps to his death in jail three days after standoff with police at Forest Lake residence

A Washington County jail inmate leapt to his death three days after driving a car well into his Forest Lake home, soaking himself with gasoline and holding off police in his garage, his wife and a family attorney said Monday.

Richard H. Bild, 45, jumped from the second level inside the Stillwater jail early Friday afternoon, said Bild's wife, Jennifer, and attorney Terry Duggins. They said he died later that day at Regions Hospital.

Assistant Jail Administrator John Warneke confirmed that Bild killed himself but declined to offer details.

"He was supposed to be on suicide watch," Jennifer Bild said.

Duggins said that Bild "should have been in a lockdown," segregated from other inmates, rather than allowed to move about. Since his arrest on June 26, the attorney said, "he made multiple threats to multiple parties that he was going to kill himself."

Richard Bild suffered from depression, Jennifer Bild said, adding that he had been fighting for custody of his children from a previous relationship and dealing with his father's terminal cancer.

She also said the two of them had been rebuilding their relationship and contemplating their future with their eight children from previous relationships.

According to the charges from the standoff on the 26th, Richard Bild drove his car through a fence and into the house in the 9700 block of 203rd Street N. shortly before noon. Jennifer Bild and another person were inside, and Richard Bild began yelling at them.

He went into the garage and then came back out to set up "makeshift booby traps with a ladder and mirrors on top of it," the criminal complaint read. He threatened to blow up the garage if officers approached. Police said he doused himself with gasoline.

As negotiations continued, smoke billowed from one corner of the garage and "eventually, the smoke and deteriorating conditions inside ... forced Bild to exit." He was arrested shortly after 1 p.m., the charges said.