Idaho
News groups sue Idaho prison leader for increased witness access to lethal injection executions
BOISE, Idaho — The Associated Press and two other news organizations are suing Idaho’s top prison official for increased access to lethal injection executions, saying the state is unconstitutionally hiding the actual administration of the deadly drugs from public view.
The AP, The Idaho Statesman and East Idaho News filed the lawsuit against Idaho Department of Correction Director Josh Tewalt in Boise’s U.S. District Court on Friday.
The news organizations contend the public has a First Amendment right to witness the entire execution process, including when execution team members push the lethal injection medications into the IV lines connected to a condemned person. Idaho’s prison officials have kept that part of the execution concealed behind screens or walls in each of the three executions completed in the last half-century.
“At its core, this case involves the press’s ability to fulfill its ‘significant role in the proper functioning of capital punishment’ by providing independent public scrutiny of the State of Idaho’s execution process,” attorney Wendy Olson wrote in court documents. She noted the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has repeatedly found that the public has the right to view executions from start to finish — including in a similar lawsuit brought by AP and other news organizations against Idaho officials in 2012. In that case, the appellate court ordered prison officials to allow media witnesses to watch as the IVs are inserted.
“The Ninth Circuit has not minced words,” Olson said, quoting from another 9th Circuit ruling from 2002: “An informed decision by the public is critical in determining whether execution by lethal injection comports with ‘the evolving standards of decency which mark the progress of a maturing society.’”
Neither Tewalt nor department spokesperson Sanda Kuzeta-Cerimagic immediately responded to a request for comment from the AP, but Tewalt has previously said the state must maintain confidentiality about the identities of execution team members and about where it obtains execution drugs.
Tewalt and other prison officials have told lawmakers in the past that anything threatening that secrecy could put Idaho’s ability to carry out executions at risk, in part because it would be difficult to find qualified volunteers willing to put someone to death.
The news organizations point out in the lawsuit, however, that media witnesses can already see other execution team members, though their identities are concealed by medical masks, head coverings and other devices. The same solution could be used for the execution team members tasked administering the lethal drugs, the news organizations said.
Idaho has only attempted four lethal injection executions since the U.S. Supreme Court lifted a moratorium on executions in the 1970s. When Keith Eugene Wells was executed in 1994, IV lines ran from his arm to a screen, behind which execution team members used a device to deliver a cocktail of lethal drugs. In the 2011 execution of Paul Ezra Rhoades and the 2012 execution of Richard Albert Leavitt, the IV lines ran through an opening in the wall of the execution chamber, into another area that was hidden from view.
The same setup was used in February, when the state attempted to execute Thomas Eugene Creech. But that execution was called off after the execution team members were unable to successfully establish an IV line despite trying eight different locations in Creech’s arms and legs.
In October, the state announced it would begin using central venous lines — threading a catheter through a large, deep vein until it reaches the condemned person’s heart — for lethal injections if attempts to insert standard IV lines fail. Prison officials also remodeled the execution chamber to add a special “execution preparation” room for the central line procedure, and installed closed-circuit cameras so that media witnesses can watch.
The news organizations want a federal judge to order the state to allow media witnesses the same closed-circuit camera access to the “Medical Team Room,” where the lethal drug preparation and administration occurs.
“There is no logical reason why the events that will take place in the Medical Team Room should fall outside the scope of the well settled First Amendment right to view an execution in its entirety,” Olson wrote.
“Simply put, there is nothing more ‘intertwined’ with the execution process than the preparation and administration of the very drugs that will effectuate Idaho’s most severe punishment,” she said.
For the second year in a row, House lawmakers will consider urging the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn its ruling legalizing same-sex marriage.
The nonbinding resolution, which carries no legal weight, says the decision in Obergefel v. Hodges violates the longstanding religious definition of marriage between one man and one woman.
“The current definition of marriage that allows for same-sex marriages is a defilement of the word marriage,” said Rep. Tony Wisniewski (R-Post Falls), who sponsors the measure.
The resolution further states that the Obergefel decision “arbitrarily and unjustly” rejects the historical definition of marriage.
Idaho voters passed a constitution amendment in 2006 that defines marriage as between one man and one woman, which was invalidated by the Obergefel ruling.
Wisniewski said regulating marriages should be a power left to the states.
Rep. Brent Crane (R-Nampa) agrees.
“If you want to get things … closer to the people with respect to some of these more complex social issues, I think the best place for those things to happen is in the states,” Crane said.
Doing so is a risk, he said.
“You may have states that choose to acknowledge [polyamorous relationships]. You may have states that choose to have relationships between adults and younger children,” Crane said.
Cities in neighboring Oregon and Washington, for example, are considering giving those in polyamorous relationships legal recognition.
But he said that risk is worth it to allow other states that choose to only recognize traditional marriages.
Four lawmakers on the House State Affairs Committee opposed the resolution.
Rep. Erin Bingham (R-Idaho Falls) said she’s tried to balance her own religious beliefs with those of others while considering the measure.
“I do feel like that it is important for us to work together, to find ways to compromise and to live together in peace and mutual respect,” Bingham said.
The resolution now goes to the House floor for consideration.
House lawmakers last year passed a similar measure, but it never received a hearing in a Senate committee.
Copyright 2026 Boise State Public Radio
Idaho
University of Idaho professor awarded $10M after TikTok tarot influencer claimed she ‘ordered’ quadruple murders
A University of Idaho professor won a $10 million judgment after a tarot TikTok influencer publicly pushed false claims that she was behind the savage quadruple slayings of four college students.
A Boise jury in US District Court ordered fortune-telling Texas TikToker Ashley Guillard on Friday to pay $10 million after concluding she falsely accused professor Rebecca Scofield of having a secret romance with one of the four victims and orchestrating their killings, the Idaho Statesman reported.
Following the verdict, Scofield thanked the jury and said she hopes the case sends a clear warning that making “false statements online have consequences in the real world.”
“The murders of the four students on November 13, 2022, were the darkest chapter in our university’s history,” Scofield told Fox News.
“Today’s decision shows that respect and care should always be granted to victims during these tragedies. I am hopeful that this difficult chapter in my life is over, and I can return to a more normal life with my family and the wonderful Moscow community.”
Scofield, the university’s history department chair, filed the lawsuit in December 2022 — just weeks after Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin were brutally stabbed to death at an off-campus rental home in Moscow, Idaho, on Nov. 13, 2022.
Guillard began uploading videos to her more than 100,000 TikTok followers in late November 2022, accusing Scofield of a secret relationship with one of the students and claiming she had “ordered” the killings, garnering millions of views across the social media platform.
The complaint states that Scofield had never met the victims and was out of state when the murders occurred.
Even after being served with cease-and-desist letters and after police publicly confirmed Scofield had no connection to the murders, the Houston-based tarot reader continued posting videos, the history professor’s legal team argued.
Guillard doubled down on her accusations against Scofield after being sued, posting a defiant video saying, “I am not stopping,” and challenging why Scofield needed three lawyers to sue her “if she’s so innocent.”
The professor’s legal team argued the defamatory accusations painted her as a criminal and accused her of professional misconduct that could derail her career.
Bryan Kohberger, then studying criminology at Washington State University, pleaded guilty in July 2025 to the quadruple murders in a deal that took the death penalty off the table. He is currently serving four consecutive life sentences in Idaho.
In June 2024, Chief US Magistrate Judge Raymond Patricco found Guillard’s statements legally defamatory, leaving damages to be decided by a jury.
During the damages trial, Scofield described the anguish of seeing her name tied to the murders online, the Idaho Statesman reported.
However, Guillard, acting as her own attorney, insisted her comments were simply beliefs based on tarot card readings.
She claimed to have psychic powers and testified that she relied on tarot cards to try to solve the shocking homicides that shook the rural college town and sparked global attention.
It took jurors less than two hours to return their verdict, the outlet reported.
The jury awarded Scofield $7.5 million in punitive damages in addition to $2.5 million in compensatory damages.
With Post wires
BOISE, Idaho — AAA is warning Idaho gas consumers that pump prices will likely rise as the conflict in Iran disrupts oil and gas supply chains worldwide.
The ongoing turmoil in the Middle East will likely push the price for a gallon of regular gasoline past the $3 mark over the coming days.
“On one hand, the crude oil market had time to account for some financial risk in the Middle East as forces mobilized, but a supply shortage somewhere affects the global picture,” says AAA Idaho public affairs director Matthew Conde. “If tankers can’t move products through the region, there could be ripple effects.”
On Monday, March 2, the average price for a gallon of regular gasoline is $2.97, reports AAA, which is 12 cents more expensive than it was a month ago but 20 cents less than this time last year.
State / Price: 1 gallon of regular gasoline
- Washington / $4.37
- Oregon / $3.92
- Nevada / $3.70
- Idaho / $2.97
- Colorado / $2.89
- Montana / $2.82
- Utah / $2.74
- Wyoming / $2.73
In terms of the most expensive fuel in the nation, Idaho currently ranks #14. However, buying a gallon of regular gas in neighboring states such as Oregon and Washington could cost a whole dollar more. In contrast, gas prices in Utah, Montana, and Wyoming are anywhere between 15 to 24 cents cheaper than fuel in the Gem State.
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