A Tunkhannock man threatened Lackawanna County sheriff\u2019s deputies when they tried to arrest him on Courthouse Square in Scranton on Wednesday, according to the criminal complaint.<\/p>\n
At about 1:30 p.m., a woman approached county deputies concerned about a man, later identified as James Harding, who was intoxicated, sitting on one of the Courthouse Square benches.<\/p>\n
Deputies already spotted the 65-year-old on camera and noted he was aware he was not allowed on Courthouse Square.<\/p>\n
When deputies approached Harding, he exhibited signs of intoxication, including a strong odor of alcohol, slurred speech, bloodshot eyes and unsteady balance, according to authorities.<\/p>\n
With a cup of beer sitting next to him, Harding repeatedly yelled profanities at the deputies. When asked to put his hands behind his back, he refused, officials said.<\/p>\n
Cpl. Kevin Murphy and Deputy David Toughill called additional deputies and took him into custody.<\/p>\n
As deputies walked him to the courthouse, he continued being disorderly and yelled, \u201cYou will lose your jobs over this,\u201d according to the complaint.<\/p>\n
He tried to spit on Toughill and then spit in Murphy\u2019s face. Once in a cell, he continued being disorderly, officers said.<\/p>\n
Harding, of Bridge Street, faces charges of aggravated assault of a law enforcement officer, resisting arrest, public drunkenness and disorderly conduct. He remains at Lackawanna County Prison in lieu of $7,500 bail. A preliminary hearing is scheduled for 10:15 a.m. on Sept. 30 before District Judge George Seig.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Tunkhannock man threatened Lackawanna County sheriff\u2019s deputies when they tried to arrest him on Courthouse Square in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":289380,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[18736,202,201,182,915,139,28,178,180,179,181,2943],"class_list":["post-289379","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-scranton","tag-burlington-county","tag-crime-and-public-safety","tag-lackawanna-county","tag-local-news","tag-new-jersey","tag-news","tag-pennsylvania","tag-scranton","tag-scranton-headlines","tag-scranton-news","tag-top-stories-stt","tag-wyoming-county"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289379","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=289379"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289379\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/289380"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=289379"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=289379"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=289379"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}