LIVINGSTON, Mont. (AP) — A state judge says a Billings man who was found near Livingston bound with a bag over his head is fit to stand trial on an evidence tampering charge.

District Judge Nels Swandal said Thursday that state health officials found 52-year-old Lionel Scott Ellison is able to help in his defense. He had been found unfit in March.

The Livingston Enterprise reports Ellison was charged after prosecutors say he set up his Yellowstone County residence to look like a crime scene and claimed to have been kidnapped and raped. He was found bound with a bag over his head in July 2010.

Two years earlier, Ellison claimed he was bound and beaten and thrown in the Yellowstone River near Billings, but prosecutors said he staged the incident to avoid sentencing in an arson case.

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