Man charged in SWAT team standoff Man invokes 5th Amendment at trial

Westlake police have charged a man in connection with a Tuesday night standoff with a SWAT team, officials said.

James Lask is charged with obstructing official business, Westlake police spokesman Capt. Jerry Vogel said.

Lask, 32, was arrested on outstanding warrants following the standoff with police.

Authorities were called just before 4:30 p.m. to the area of Dover Center Road after several gunshots were heard. Police were unable to determine where the gunshots came from.

Investigators called the SWAT team and set up a perimeter around the house. He refused to come out of the home until police called his mother. She told police Lask was bipolar, off his medication and had been threatening suicide for the last week.

Witnesses told police that Lask was known to have guns and had threatened a neighbor with a weapon on Thanksgiving, police said.

Lask surrendered to police

A Holland man who pleaded guilty to orchestrating a scheme to defraud investors invoked the Fifth Amendment Thursday when called to testify in the trial of co-defendant Arvel “Ray” Henderson II.

Mark O. Wittenmyer, 55, was called to the witness stand by Henderson’s defense counsel outside of the jury’s presence. U.S District Judge Jeffrey Helmick said it was appropriate for Wittenmyer to assert his right not to answer questions that might incriminate him “in that he does have a pending appeal.”

Closing arguments are set to begin at 9 a.m. Friday in the trial of Henderson, 48, a real estate agent with Re/ Max Central Group, who is charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering and four counts of money laundering for transactions involving Wittenmyer.

Wittenmyer pleaded guilty