Article: Woman sentenced to five months in jail for lying to grand jury

[Phil in Paris]

Posted on Thu, Mar. 24, 2005

Associated Press


FARGO, N.D. - A woman has been ordered to serve five months in jail for lying to a federal grand jury investigating the 1999 disappearance of an 82-year-old LaMoure County farmer.

Bonnie Rosland, 61, of West Fargo, also must serve five months at a Fargo halfway house, U.S. District Judge Rodney Webb ordered Wednesday.

Rosland pleaded guilty to a perjury charge in federal court last June 3.

Authorities said she lied to a grand jury nearly three years ago about the whereabouts of her son. The grand jury was looking into the disappearance of Norman Limesand of Marion.

Investigators found traces of Limesand's blood and his eyeglasses on the approach to a LaMoure County farmstead where Rosland lived with her son, Steve Thomas, Assistant U.S. Attorney Keith Reisenauer said.

Rosland's former home is about 2 1/2 miles from Limesand's farm.

Reisenauer asked Webb on Wednesday to order Rosland to prison for five years, saying she lied in an investigation that may involve kidnapping and murder. The judge rejected that idea.

"You suggest that I should consider the possibility of kidnapping and murder to raise her sentence," Webb said. "If you're not sure enough to bring charges, why should we put her in jail for five years, when it's not sure what occurred?"

Rosland told a federal grand jury on April 16, 2002, that she gave her son a ride to Fargo the day Limesand was reported missing. Telephone records and interviews proved they were home.

Court records say investigators searched Rosland's LaMoure County home twice, and interviewed Rosland and Thomas. He has not been charged in the case.

Limesand disappeared Nov. 12, 1999. His pickup was found four days later, parked along a street in Moorhead, Minn. Authorities said DNA tests showed that blood on the pickup belonged to Limesand, but his body never was found. He was declared dead in 2002.

Rosland criticized the investigation of her son.

"I really don't think they found anything, otherwise why wouldn't they have arrested my son?" she said. "This has gone on for years."

About 20 members of Limesand's family attended Wednesday's sentencing.

"The family is just frustrated," said Milton Limesand, who farms near his father's home. "It's been 5 1/2 years."

Officials at the state Bureau of Criminal Investigation said the investigation into Limesand's disappearance is ongoing.

The day before Limesand disappeared, he had a heated argument with Thomas about a water drainage problem near the farm house Thomas shared with his mother, according to court testimony and interviews with Limesand family members.

Limesand had been a township supervisor. Rosland and Thomas moved to West Fargo after he disappeared.

Webb gave Rosland until April 6 to turn herself in and begin serving her sentence.

http://www.grandforks.com/mld/grandforks/11219684.htm