Holmen homicide suspect Phillips takes stand, says she wasn’t trying to run over husband

Lori Phillips has taken the witness stand at her reckless homicide trial in La Crosse.

Phillips is accused of killing her husband Mark with a truck during an argument at their home in 2019. The former Holmen woman says she did not purposely strike Mark with the vehicle, but may have hit him accidentally.

On Thursday, Phillips testified that it was hard to see in front of her at the time her husband was close to the truck, because of the lighting. “But I knew that he had cleared the front, because he was not in my vision,” she said.

Phillips says Mark had been drinking the night he was killed, and had accused her of wanting to have sex with other men. She claims that if she did strike him with the truck, she wasn’t aware of it. “I would have stopped,” she told jurors. “I would have stopped and helped him.” Mark died after receiving multiple injuries, including head wounds and broken ribs.

The case in La Crosse County Court began on Monday, and Phillips returns to the witness stand on Friday. Local television stations and the Court TV channel have been carrying livestream coverage of the Phillips trial. It’s possible that the trial could carry over into next week.