Authorities stated Friday they consider the deaths of an 83-year-old man who was walking his dogs and a 72-year-old man who lived in a distant cabin are linked to the escape of an Idaho white supremacist prison gang member and an confederate after a Boise hospital ambush.
The escaped prisoner, Skylar Meade, and the confederate, a not too long ago launched inmate named Nicholas Umphenour — each members of the Aryan Knights gang — had been arrested in Twin Falls, Idaho, on Thursday afternoon. Their arrests got here 36 hours after Umphenour shot and wounded two Idaho corrections officers whereas they had been getting ready to return Meade to jail from a hospital, police stated.
Investigators stated Thursday that whereas on the run, Meade and Umphenour might have been answerable for the deaths of two males, one in Nez Perce County and the opposite in Clearwater County, each in northern Idaho, about seven hours away from the place they had been arrested.
Coroners on Friday recognized the sufferer in Nez Perce County as James L. Mauney, 83, of Juliaetta, who was reported lacking on Wednesday when he left home in his silver Chrysler Pacifica minivan to take his two dogs — a white Jack Russell terrier and a brown Chesapeake Bay retriever — to a walking path.
“He’s my everything,” stated his spouse, Liliia Mauney, her voice cracking.
Idaho State Police returned the dogs to the household. One, Leo, “actually misses him, he cries and goes out wanting within the yard, in search of him,” Liliia Mauney stated.
The sufferer in Clearwater County was Gerald Don Henderson, 72, who was discovered lifeless outdoors his distant cabin close to Orofino.
“I can’t understand the senseless murder of this beautiful man,” Henderson’s companion, Ron Thompson, instructed The Associated Press on Friday. “Such a senseless, senseless thing to do.”
Thompson stated he and Henderson met Umphenour a few decade in the past via one other “neighbor kid” that they had taken in. Umphenour, who was then in his late teenagers, was not getting alongside together with his father, Thompson stated, and he stayed on the cabin with Henderson and Thompson for a few month.
Living with Umphenour was scary, Thompson stated, as a result of he “would always talk about shooting people.” The couple finally kicked him out.
Thompson and Henderson met via a courting website in 2006 and had been life companions since, although Thompson moved out of the cabin in 2015 and resettled in Seattle as a result of he grew bored with the remoted space. Henderson, who was 17 years older than Thompson, had problem sharing publicly that they had been a pair in conservative Idaho, and the 2 by no means married.
“It was not unknown that we were a couple, but we just never talked about it,” he stated.
They dreamed of shifting again in collectively, he stated.
About a month in the past, Umphenour — recent out of jail, the place he served time on theft and gun convictions — trudged via deep snow to spend an hour on the cabin with Henderson, consuming espresso and speaking. Henderson felt uneasy in regards to the go to and wasn’t certain why Umphenour had come, Thompson stated.
On Wednesday, when Thompson discovered that Umphenour had been linked to Meade’s escape from the hospital, he grew fearful and known as the sheriff’s workplace to request that deputies verify in on Henderson.
Police discovered him lifeless outdoors his home, the place in addition they discovered what might have been the escaped prisoner’s shackles, Clearwater County Coroner Dennis Fuller stated Friday.
Fuller described Thompson as “a kindly old man who took in some ne’er-do-well guys and tried to help them.”
Mauney’s stolen minivan was discovered at a home in Twin Falls on Thursday, and as police secured the realm, Meade and Umphenour tried to flee in numerous automobiles however had been arrested, Idaho State Police stated.
They made preliminary courtroom appearances Friday, together with a girl who drove one of many two automobiles they had been touring in once they had been arrested. Meade and Umphenour had been being held on $2 million bond.
The lady, recognized as Tonia Huber, was charged with harboring a fugitive, eluding police and drug possession. Idaho Fifth Judicial District Judge Ben Harmer set her bail at $500,000 after a prosecutor stated she had pushed 100 mph (161 kmh) via neighborhoods as she tried to evade police.
None of the three entered pleas.
Meade, 31, was sentenced to 20 years in prison in 2017 for taking pictures at a sheriff’s sergeant throughout a high-speed chase. Umphenour was launched from the identical jail — the Idaho Maximum Security Institution in Kuna, south of Boise — in January. The two had at occasions been housed collectively and had mutual associates out and in of jail, officers stated.
The attack on the corrections officers got here simply after 2 a.m. Wednesday within the ambulance bay of Saint Alphonsus Regional Medical Center, as they had been getting ready to return Meade to the jail. He had been delivered to the hospital earlier within the night time as a result of he injured himself, officers stated.
After the ambush, one officer shot by Umphenour was in crucial however steady situation, police stated, whereas the second wounded officer had severe however non-life-threatening accidents. A 3rd corrections officer additionally sustained non-life-threatening accidents when a responding police officer — mistakenly believing the shooter was nonetheless within the emergency room and seeing an armed person close to the doorway — opened hearth.
Correction Director Josh Tewalt stated Thursday one guard had been launched from the hospital, and the situations of the opposite two are steady and bettering.
The division is reviewing its insurance policies and practices in mild of the escape, he stated. The attack got here amid a wave of gun violence at hospitals and medical facilities, which have struggled to adapt to the rise of threats.
“We’re channeling every resource we have to trying to understand exactly how they went about planning it,” Tewalt stated.
Recently, Meade had been held in solitary confinement as a result of officers deemed him a safety danger.
The Aryan Knights jail gang shaped within the mid-Nineteen Nineties in Idaho. In courtroom paperwork federal prosecutors described it as a “scourge” throughout the state’s jail system.
“The hate-fueled gang engages in many types of criminal activity and casts shadows of intimidation, addiction, and violence over prison life,” prosecutors wrote.
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Johnson reported from Seattle and Thiessen from Anchorage, Alaska.
