Idaho
Will Idaho Push Forward With One of the Rarest and Most Horrible Types of Executions?
The state of Idaho tried to kill Thomas Creech once. It failed. It now wants a second chance.
Last week, a state judge gave the state the green light. This decision is grotesque and is made all the more so because it masks the cruelty of a second execution behind a smoke screen of legalisms.
Creech, one of the country’s longest-serving death-row inmates, has a lengthy and troubling criminal record, having been convicted, as the Associated Press notes, of “five murders in three states and suspected of several more.” He is on Idaho’s death row because, while he was already serving a life term, he “beat a fellow inmate, 22-year-old David Dale Jensen, to death in 1981.”
Creech pleaded guilty to first-degree murder in the Jensen case. An Idaho trial judge found that he had “exhibited utter disregard for human life” and sentenced him to death.
Idaho intended to carry out that sentence months ago, Feb. 28, at 10 in the morning.
The AP reports, “The execution team was made up entirely of volunteers.” According to the story, for nearly an hour, “Thomas Eugene Creech lay strapped to a table … as medical team members poked and prodded at his arms and legs, hands and feet, trying to find a vein through which they could end his life.”
Three team members “tried eight times to establish an IV. … In some cases, they couldn’t access the vein, and in others they could but had concerns about vein quality.”
At 10:58 a.m., the prison warden told them to give up and stopped Creech’s execution. He was returned to his cell.
No state is required to carry out a second execution attempt after failing the first time. Whether Creech gets another trip to the death chamber is entirely up to the state of Idaho, which must obtain a new death warrant.
It is not the first state to have to make this choice.
Almost 80 years ago, Louisiana faced a similar choice when its effort to electrocute Willie Francis was botched. When the state announced its intention to try again, Francis went to court to attempt to stop it. His case made it all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.
As the court recounted the relevant facts: “Francis was prepared for execution and on May 3, 1946, … was placed in the official electric chair of the State of Louisiana. … The executioner threw the switch, but, presumably because of some mechanical difficulty, death did not result.” Evidence was offered to suggest that during the botched execution, Francis had experienced extreme pain, that his “lips puffed out and he groaned and jumped so that the chair came off the floor.”
Yet Justice Stanley Reed, writing for a majority of the court, held that the first, unsuccessful execution would not “add an element of cruelty to a subsequent execution.” The constitutional question, as Reed saw it, turned instead on the behavior of those in charge of Francis’ first execution attempt.
Reed found those officials to have carried out their duties in a “careful and humane manner,” with “no suggestion of malevolence” and no “purpose to inflict unnecessary pain.” He called what happened to Francis an “unforeseeable accident … for which no man is to blame” and concluded that the state could proceed with its plan to put him to death.
Francis was executed by electric chair on May 9, 1947.
A state wanting a second chance to execute someone after a first botched attempt occurred again in 2009, when Ohio failed to kill Romell Broom by lethal injection.
The execution team was repeatedly unable to find a usable vein in his arms or groin, even as Broom tried to help them. After 18 attempts over two hours, then-Gov. Ted Strickland, a Republican, halted the execution.
Broom went to court, arguing that a second execution would constitute an additional punishment and would violate the Fifth Amendment guarantee that no one be tried or punished for the same crime twice. He also claimed that it would inflict the kind of cruelty prohibited by the Eighth Amendment.
The Ohio Supreme Court disagreed with both contentions.
Like the U.S. Supreme Court in the Francis case, it found that the members of the execution team hadn’t inflicted cruel and unusual punishment because they weren’t deliberately trying to torture Broom. The justices also concluded that a second execution would not violate the double-jeopardy clause because the lethal chemicals had not started to flow, and thus Broom’s first execution had not actually begun.
The state never got its second chance, however. Broom died from COVID-19 in 2020.
Nine years after the Broom debacle, Alabama made a different choice about what to do when its first attempt to kill Doyle Hamm had to be stopped before he died. Like Francis and Broom before him, Hamm also sued to prevent the state from trying to execute him again.
This time, instead of fighting until the end, the state settled the case and agreed not to proceed with a second execution. Hamm died of cancer in 2021.
This brings us back to Creech. He filed suit in August. According to an article in Idaho Reports, his attorneys argued that executing Creech again would amount to “psychological torture,” violating the Eighth Amendment.
Prosecutor Dayton Reed responded that it would not be cruel and usual punishment if the state were to attempt a second execution, because “there is no evidence that the first execution was malicious or intentionally painful.” Reed contended, “Creech is not entitled to a painless execution, only one that is free of purposeful cruelty.”
On Thursday, Judge Jason Scott sided with the state and dismissed Creech’s suit. Scott said that a second execution would not be a form of double jeopardy because the state “has yet to administer the legislatively authorized (and judicially ordered) punishment of death for the crime Creech committed.” A second execution “would not subject him to more punishment than the legislature authorized for his crime.”
Turning to Creech’s claim about cruelty, Scott conceded that he didn’t doubt that “enduring one execution attempt and facing another has traumatized Creech.” Despite his “heinous crimes,” Scott continued, “Creech is a human being whose suffering is worthy of consideration.”
But Scott didn’t appear to give Creech much consideration. He seemed much more interested in the intricacies of the Eighth Amendment.
That amendment does not, the judge observed, “categorically prohibit, as cruel and unusual punishment, a second attempt to carry out a death sentence.” Taking refuge in the Supreme Court’s 77-year-old decision in the Francis case, Scott deemed what had happened to Creech “a humanly conducted, though unsuccessful, execution attempt.” There was nothing in the record, he argued, to show that the failure had been intentional or malicious.
Scott went on to say that even if Creech could prove that another effort to put him to death by lethal injection would be cruel, Idaho could execute him anyway by firing squad, another authorized execution method in the state.
And again highlighting his fondness for legal technicalities, Scott found that Creech’s claims, even if they were valid, would not be “litigable in a post-conviction setting.”
So, pending an appeal, Scott gave Idaho the go-ahead to again try to kill Creech. That he would do so is a travesty of justice and an illustration of what former Judge John Noonan once described as one of the legal system’s deepest failings: its neglect of persons as “ends in themselves.”
As noted in a Harvard Law Review article discussing Noonan’s philosophy on judging, he called “for applying legal rules so that humans can respond to each other as persons worthy of love and concern rather than as mere factors in legal equations.” That is why Noonan would criticize Scott.
Noonan would find Scott’s decision to be an example of legal judgments made in a way that is “bereft of a sense of the persons they govern.” In such situations, “legal roles become distorted, rules become masks, and justice is denied.”
Giving Idaho or any other state a second chance to execute someone who has experienced what Creech has is precisely the kind of distorted, legally sanctioned injustice that Noonan warned us about.
Idaho
Bryan Kohberger investigated over nearby home invasion year before alleged slayings of 4 University of Idaho students
Idaho murder suspect Bryan Kohberger was once investigated in connection to a chilling home invasion that took place mere miles from where he allegedly slaughtered four college students inside their off-campus housing in 2022, according to a new report.
New information about the accused killer comes after ABC News obtained bodycam footage of police responding to a suspected home invasion in nearby Pullman, Wash., in October 2021 — more than a year before the University of Idaho students were stabbed to death.
“I heard my door open and I looked over, and someone was wearing a ski mask and had a knife,” a frightened woman told police.
“I kicked the s–t out of their stomach and screamed super loud, and they like flew back into my closet and then ran out my door and up the stairs.”
The alleged incident — which took place just 10 miles from the gruesome slayings in Moscow, Idaho — happened at 3:30 a.m., the woman told police, adding that the masked intruder was silent the whole time.
Her roommate immediately called the police, the outlet reported, but the case was left unsolved as police were left without a suspect or evidence at the time.
The terrifying incident shared eerie similarities with the gruesome quadruple University of Idaho murders.
Kohberger, 29, is accused of butchering students Ethan Chapin, 20, Xana Kernodle, 20, Kaylee Goncalves, 21, and Madison Mogen, 21, around 4 a.m. inside their off-campus house on Nov. 13, 2022.
A surviving housemate later told police she saw a masked man with “bushy eyebrows” fleeing the house after overhearing cries and sounds of a struggle.
Kohberger, a criminology Ph.D. student at Washington State University, was arrested at his parents’ Pennsylvania home on Dec. 30 and charged with four counts of first-degree murder and one count of burglary — charges he has since pleaded not guilty.
Thirteen days later he was named a person of interest in the Pullman case, ABC reported, but is no longer considered a suspect.
“We have no reason or evidence to believe he was involved in this burglary at this time,” Pullman police told the outlet, citing a height difference between the alleged attackers.
While Kohberger is 6 feet tall, the alleged attacker in the Pullman incident was described as being 5’3′ to 5’5′. The accused stabber was also not yet enrolled at Washington State University at the time of the 2021 incident, the outlet reported.
The case is now closed but remains unsolved, police said.
“My family and I have been frustrated that the case was not investigated more in-depth or resolved,” the victim in the break-in told the outlet.
Kohberger’s highly anticipated trial is slated to begin in August and last through November.
The lengthy trial, which was moved to Idaho’s capital of Boise, will include two phases — one to determine his guilt or innocence, and the other, if he’s found guilty, to determine whether he should receive the death penalty.
Bryan Kohberger, the suspect in the Idaho quadruple murder case, was once investigated in connection with a home invasion in Pullman, Washington. This opens many doors for a flock of questions.
Who is Bryan Kohberger?
Kohberger, a 28-year-old PhD criminology student at Washington State University, was arrested weeks after the Idaho murders at his parents’ home in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania. He now faces four first-degree murder charges and a felony burglary charge. Prosecutors allege Kohberger meticulously planned the attack, stalking the victims’ off-campus rental home prior to the killings.
The Pullman home invasion occurred in October 2021, just 10 miles from Moscow, Idaho, where four college students were brutally stabbed to death in November 2022. Newly released body camera footage cited by ABC News provides a bodycam footage of the break-in that left a young woman traumatized and fearing for her life.
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“I heard my door open and I looked over, and someone was wearing a ski mask and had a knife,” the woman told officers in the footage, her voice trembling. “I kicked the s*** out of their stomach and screamed super loud. They flew back into my closet and then ran out my door and up the stairs.”
Kohberger named person of interest in Pullman case after Idaho murders
The alleged attack happened around 3:30 a.m. The masked intruder, who carried a knife, entered her bedroom silently. Despite her quick reaction and her roommate’s immediate call to 911, police found no trace of the suspect or any physical evidence.
Just over a year later, on November 13, 2022, the town of Moscow, Idaho, was shaken by the brutal murders of Madison Mogen, 21; Kaylee Goncalves, 21; Xana Kernodle, 20; and Ethan Chapin, 20. Survivors in the home described a masked man with “bushy eyebrows” fleeing after hearing cries and the sounds of a violent struggle.
Thirteen days after the Idaho murders, Kohberger was named a person of interest in the Pullman case. The eerie similarities between the two incidents—both involving a masked intruder, a knife, and nighttime break-ins—drew immediate attention. However, authorities later clarified that Kohberger is no longer considered a suspect in the Pullman case.
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Despite initial suspicions, critical differences between the Pullman and Moscow cases ultimately ruled out Kohberger’s involvement in the earlier incident. The victim of the Pullman break-in described the intruder as 5’3” to 5’5”, while Kohberger stands six feet tall.
ICYMI 2024
In Case You Missed It: Some of our best stories of the year
The BoiseDev team is off for the holiday break. (We’ll keep an eye out for any major breaking stories.) While our team enjoys some downtime, we bring you a few stories you might have missed this year. A note that some stories may have new updates since the original date of publication. Have something we should know? Email us.
Idaho’s most expensive currently active residential real estate listing is located in Parma.
The $22.5-million listing on Highway 95 in Parma spans more than 450 acres and includes a massive home, or, as it’s described, “owner’s lodge,” that totals roughly 9,000 square feet.
“Parma Lodge and Stables is among the Northwest’s premier equestrian, sporting, and lifestyle properties,” the real estate listing boasts. “The ranch is conveniently located 45 minutes west of Idaho’s capital city of Boise and 20 minutes from Treasure Valley Executive Airport in Caldwell.”
The property, more commonly known as Tree Top Ranches, is owned by Larry and Marianne Williams.
The couple is known locally for founding the Idaho Timber Corporation, which owns timberlands across the US. They also are behind significant charitable giving, including donating Marianne Williams Park in Boise, giving funds to Boise State Athletics, and more. Larry Williams was also involved in the Big City Coffee case against Boise State and has pledged to stop giving funds to the school over his view of the political leaning of the school’s curriculum. The couple has given significant funds to conservative lawmakers, ponied up dollars for a failed 2018 effort to legalize a form of gambling known as historical horse racing, and recently poured funds into a political action committee aiming to steer legislation related to fentanyl.
Bit of Kentucky in Idaho
Idaho Statesman columnist Brian Murphy reported in 2012 that The Williams sold their share in Idaho Timber in 2005, and used a portion of the proceeds for the ranch operation. They bought it from NFL Hall of Fame player Jerry Kramer in 2000.
“We determined we wanted to start a horse farm around ’99-2000,” Williams told the Statesman in 2012. “We looked at thoroughbreds, and we looked at quarter horses. We came back (to Kentucky) and just fell in love with the place. We couldn’t do it here so we decided we would try to do it in Idaho on a much smaller scale.”
The property, which includes an 18-stall horse barn, was used to raise horses for competitive racing – including the Kentucky Derby, the Statesman reported. The sales flier mentions four separate times that the property is “home to one of the most successful thoroughbred breeding operations” in the western part of the United States.
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The ranch is bordered on one side by the Boise River, which the sales website says is lined with cottonwood trees and “abundant wildlife.” Much of the land is used for horse pasture with sprinkler irrigation as well as cropland with flood irrigation used for growing corn.
The home includes eight bedrooms and eight bathrooms and was built in 2001. There’s a separate four-bedroom manager’s residence, a training/breaking pin, several equipment storage buildings and a large shop building. It sits on a set of lakes on the property.
Larry Williams told the Statesman in 2012 that the whole property was modeled on Kentucky horse farms, and had his team visit Kentucky to draw inspiration.
“It wasn’t a grandiose plan. That wasn’t the way it started. We kept building a building and then another building. It got out of control,” Williams said. “It’s a baby. The ones in Kentucky are much bigger.”
The property is offered for sale by Trent Jones of Hall and Hall.
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