Police: Woman bit officers on way to jail

A Bethlehem woman who was being arraigned on assault charges refused to leave the Bethlehem police station for transport to Northampton County Jail, bit three officers and tried to strangle herself with a piece of weather stripping from a police van, according to court papers.

Laura Ellen Ettwein, 33, of the first block of Finady Avenue, is charged with three counts of aggravated assault of a police officer, two counts of institutional vandalism, and a single count of resisting arrest. She was previously sent to Northampton County Jail under $25,000 bail because of an unrelated assault charge. According to court records: Authorities finished a video arraignment for Ettwein at 10:15 a.m. Friday at the Bethlehem police station on charges of strangulation, assault and harassment related to an incident in the city.

District Judge Nancy Matos Gonzales

set bail at $25,000 in that case, but when police began to ready Ettwein for the trip to Easton, she refused to budge.

“I’m not leaving,” she told police. Authorities rolled Ettwein out of the station in an office chair. After being taken to the transport van, she refused to get in and sit down. Officers tried to force her into the van but she struggled until she was placed on the ground.

Ettwein bit a detective while on the ground. Police got her back up and tried to pull her into the van and she bit an officer.

Ettwein then started to rip the weather stripping from the rear passenger side of the van’s door frame. She tried to wrap the material around her neck and bit an officer who tried to take the weather stripping away.

Authorities said they were eventually able to get Ettwein into the van and strap her in. In addition to the weather stripping, police said the transport van’s rear bumper was dented in the struggle with Ettwein.

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