Felony Cases Double In Missoula County

Missoula, MT (KGVO-AM News) - The Missoula County Attorney’s Office filed 28 new felony complaints this week, which is 13 more than last week and about twice the weekly average. According to County Attorney Matt Jennings, that's the most they have had in a week this year.

“In fact, we haven’t even broken 20 felonies in 2025,” Jennings said. “We're going to get together and see what was going on and if there's anything that we can do preemptively to address some of that. We had 15 different violent crimes against other persons, thirteen of which were domestic violence related. That's really tough to see.”

There were three endangerment crimes, six property crimes, and four drug crimes as well. Jennings said there were also some alarming allegations this week.

“There was an allegation of kidnapping in one of the cases that is still under investigation,” Jennings said. “There were a bunch of cases that we turned back over to Municipal Court. We only handle things that are either a felony or happened outside the city limits of Missoula. Most of the misdemeanors go to Municipal Court, and those are prosecuted by the City Attorney's Office.”

Legislature Considers New Bill

Jennings said the Montana County Attorney’s Association has been pushing forward a bill to strengthen some of our options for hard drug-related DUIs. They just had a bill, HB 344, pass the Senate and it is going back to the House.

“We hope that it is going to be signed by the governor soon and become law,” Jennings said. “Our DUI laws are really structured around alcohol and people's understanding of what alcohol does to your body and your driving behavior. But for some of the hard drug DUI's, that's been much more challenging.”

For instance, Jennings said methamphetamine is most dangerous maybe a day or so after somebody uses it.

“It’s often the most dangerous when somebody has a lower amount in their blood because they've been up for 24 or 48 hours,” Jennings said. “They're on the nod. That’s what they call it on the street, and they may be falling asleep at the wheel. Whereas alcohol might be most dangerous when you're at the highest blood alcohol content.”

READ MORE: Missoula News - Crime Reports

Jennings said Montana’s Standardized Field Sobriety Tests are all based around alcohol.

“There are things called Drug Recognition Experts, but those take specialized training, and not every community has somebody that's considered a DRE,” Jennings said. “We're really happy the legislature decided to take up this issue. It's going to help protect our roads from some hard drug DUI offenders.”

The Missoula County Attorney’s Office provides a weekly crime report every Friday morning at 9:00 on Talk Back. You can listen to Jennings’ full report below: