Idaho death row | Murder Database

Chad Daybell Sentenced To Death For 3 Murders

Chad Daybell has been sentenced to death by the State of Idaho for a triple murder

According to court documents Chad Daybell for the murder of his first wife Tamara “Tammy” Daybell, 49,and his second wife Lori Vallow’s two children, Joshua “JJ” Vallow, 7, and Tylee Ryan, 16.

Chad Daybell would go to the home of Tamara “Tammy” Daybell and would strangle the woman to death.

Chad Daybell second wife Lori Vallow was convicted of the murders of her two children Joshua Vallow and Tylee Ryan earlier this year

Apparently Chad Daybell and Lori Vallow believed the only way they could truly move on was to murder those tied to their past

Chad Daybell would be convicted of murder and conspiracy as well as insurance fraud and would be sentenced to death

Chad Daybell Case

Chad Daybell was sentenced to death Saturday upon the recommendation of the jury that convicted him of first-degree murder and conspiracy charges in the killings of his first wife and two children of his second wife.

Daybell was convicted Thursday of first-degree murder and conspiracy charges in the deaths of his first wife, Tammy Daybell, and two of his second wife’s children – 16-year-old Tylee Ryan and 7-year-old Joshua “JJ” Vallow – in a case prosecutors claim was fueled by power, sex, money and apocalyptic spiritual beliefs.

Judge Steven Boyce on Saturday formally imposed the death sentence after a jury, in a lengthy verdict form read in court earlier, said it found that penalty was appropriate under the law. The judge also imposed a 15-year prison sentence for insurance fraud charges.

Daybell had a blank expression as Boyce sentenced him to death. The judge said jurors had “found beyond a reasonable doubt … that the aggravating circumstances when weighed against the mitigating circumstances do not make the imposition of the death penalty unjust.”

The sequestered jury began deliberating his fate Friday afternoon and mulled the case for six hours before ending for the night. Jurors continued deliberations Saturday about 8:30 a.m. MT, and at 10:45 a.m. the Ada County courts announced the verdict had been reached.

Jurors heard contrasting portraits of the man from lawyers before beginning deliberations in a case that drew national attention in part because of what prosecutors described as the couple’s “doomsday” religious beliefs. The sensational triple murder was featured in a Netflix true-crime documentary in 2022.

In his opening statement to the jury on Friday, prosecutor Rob Wood asked them to consider aggravating factors that would make Daybell eligible for the death penalty.

First, the three murders, he said, were committed for remuneration. Daybell was also convicted of insurance fraud stemming from life insurance policies that allegedly paid him money after his first wife’s death. His second wife, as well as Daybell, also were convicted of grand theft because she continued to draw Social Security benefits for her children after their deaths.

Additionally, Wood told the jury, the murders of the three victims were “especially heinous, atrocious or cruel, manifesting exceptional depravity.”

“This defendant exhibited utter disregard for human life,” Wood added. “The defendant, by his conduct, whether such conduct was before, during or after the commission of the murders at hand, has exhibited a propensity to commit murder, which will probably constitute a continuing threat to society.”

The prosecutor concluded, “It is your decision whether one or more of these aggravators has been proven. And if it has been, you must decide if, under these circumstances, imposition of the death penalty would be just or unjust.”

The verdict came about a year after Daybell’s second wife, Lori Vallow Daybell, was also convicted of the murder of her children and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. She was also convicted of conspiring to kill Tammy Daybell. Vallow Daybell has appealed her convictions to the state Supreme Court, with her legal team raising the issue of whether she was mentally competent to stand trial.

Authorities have said they believe Tylee and JJ were killed in September 2019 – the month they were last reported to have been seen – and that Tammy Daybell was found dead in her Idaho home on October 19, 2019, a few weeks before Chad Daybell married Vallow Daybell.

Addressing the jury Friday, defense lawyer John Prior portrayed Daybell as a once “quiet, reserved, shy young man” who grew up in Springville, Utah, a small, tight knit “town of faith.” Daybell, his lawyer said, met his first wife, Tammy, and they were married for 29 years, raising five “wonderful” children “very deep in their faith, very deep in their commitment to family.”

But Daybell’s life changed in late 2018, Prior said, when he met Vallow Daybell, who had already been married multiple times.

“Everything that glitters is not gold,” he told jurors. “Lori Vallow glittered. She was not gold. She was the trajectory that changed the plan… Chaos hits and all of these things start cascading and this thing becomes very complicated and difficult.”

Prior said the new relationship with Vallow was like “this bomb dropped” on the life of “the small town boy from Springville.”

“We have to look back at that,” he said. “You examine what Chad Daybell’s past was prior to the bomb being dropped, the Lori Vallow bomb being dropped… If it wasn’t for that trajectory coming in and changing the path, is this where we would be going? It’s not where we’d be going.”

Jurors also heard from relatives of the victims on Friday.

“It makes me angry and it destroys me to know Tammy was treated how she was,” Tammy Daybell’s father, Ron Douglas, told jurors. “I find it comforting to know that Tammy is resting peacefully in Utah, buried alone and near her beloved mother.”

Kay Woodcock spoke about her grandson JJ and her step niece Tylee.

“I sit here today and try and explain the immense pain that me and everyone in my family continues to endure daily,” she said. “But how do I do that?”

“I can tell you there have been too many situations in the past few years where we were slammed with the fact that JJ won’t hit another milestone,” she said of her grandson. “The constant question remains: Who would he have become? What kind of man would he have been?”

Woodcock remembered Tylee as “the most precious, blond-haired, blue-eyed little girl” and an “absolute mama’s girl.”

Woodcock added, breaking into tears: “There’s a hole in my heart, in the hearts of every member of my family, that can never be filled and will remain for the rest of my life.”

Tylee’s aunt, Annie Cushing, remembered her walking around the house singing with “the voice of an angel.”

“Tylee had her whole life ahead of her. She had dignity, she had dreams, she had goals. This defendant stole all of that,” Cushing said.

Kelsee Douglas, Tammy’s sister-in-law, told jurors that “pain, fractured relationships and unhealed wounds are all part of the aftermath” of the murders.

“This is the legacy of anguish and sorrow that will haunt our family for generations,” she added.

Tammy’s brother, Michael Douglas, lamented that “the nightmare fodder I have been provided will last me a lifetime.”

Daybell declined to address the court after the victim impact statements.

Law enforcement found the remains of Tylee and JJ on Chad Daybell’s Fremont County property in June 2020, authorities said.

“It’s a sad day. JJ would have been 12 years old,” JJ’s grandfather, Larry Woodcock, said after the verdict Thursday.

Woodcock remembered the victims, and asked the same question, over and over.

“What did they accomplish? Nothing. What did they do? They destroyed families,” Woodcock said of Daybell and Lori Vallow Daybell.

But the defendants, Larry Woodcock said, could not destroy the memories relatives have of the victims. “They can’t take that,” he added, growing emotional at one point. When he heard the jury verdict in court, he said, he felt like he couldn’t breathe.

During opening statements, the prosecutor and defense attorney painted contrasting portraits of the defendant.

The state described him as a power-hungry and grandiose man who would stop at nothing for “what he considered his rightful destiny.” His defense lawyer portrayed Daybell as a religious man driven into an unfortunate relationship by a “beautiful, vivacious woman” who knew “how to get what she wants.”

“Two dead children buried in the defendant Chad Daybell’s backyard,” Wood said in his first words to the jury at the start of trial.

“The next month his wife is found dead in their marital bed. Seventeen days after the death of his wife, Tammy Daybell, this defendant is photographed laughing and dancing on a beach in Hawaii at his wedding to Lori Vallow, a woman who was his mistress and the mother of the children buried in the graves on his property. Three dead bodies.”

When Daybell “had a chance at what he considered his rightful destiny,” Wood said, he “made sure that no person and no law would stand in his way.”

“His desire for sex, money and power led him to pursue those ambitions,” the prosecutor added. “And this pursuit led to the deaths of his wife and Lori’s two innocent children.”

Tammy Daybell was initially believed to have died in her sleep, and Chad Daybell remarried less than three weeks after her death in 2019.

Prior said Daybell’s life began to change after he met Vallow Daybell, a “beautifully stunning woman” who “starts giving him a lot of attention” and eventually lured him into an “inappropriate” and “unfortunate” extramarital relationship.

Vallow Daybell’s two children from a previous marriage were last seen on different days in September 2019. Tylee Ryan was a “normal, vibrant teenage girl” who loved her friends and her little brother, JJ, was on the autism spectrum and required special care, according to Wood.

In late November 2019, relatives asked police in Rexburg, Idaho, to do a welfare check on JJ because they hadn’t talked to him recently. Police didn’t find him at the family’s house but did see Vallow Daybell and Daybell, who said JJ was staying with a family friend in Arizona, according to authorities.

When police returned with a search warrant the next day, the couple was gone. They were ultimately found in Hawaii in January 2020.

In June 2020, law enforcement officials found the remains of Tylee and JJ on Daybell’s property in Fremont County, Idaho. Vallow Daybell and Daybell were indicted on murder charges in May 2021.

Tylee was believed to have been killed between September 8 and 9, 2019, and JJ between September 22 and 23, according to prosecutors.

“We are filled with unfathomable sadness that these two bright stars were stolen from us, and only hope that they died without pain or suffering,” the families of the children said in a statement after the remains were found.

https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/01/us/chad-daybell-murder-sentencing-death-penalty/index.html

Chad Daybell Now

Chad Guy Daybell
IDOC #: 158991
Status: In custody
Age: 56

Idaho Maximum Security Institution J Block

Offense	Sentencing County	Case No.	Sentence Satisfaction Date
Insurance Fraud	Fremont	CR22-21-1623	Life
Criminal Conspiracy	Fremont	CR22-21-1623	Death
Murder I	Fremont	CR22-21-1623	Death

Keith Wells Executed For 2 Idaho Murders

Keith Wells was executed by the State of Idaho for a double murder

According to court documents Keith Wells would rob a bar and in the process beat to death two individuals: 23-year-old John Justad and 20-year-old Brandi Rains

Keith Wells would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death

Keith Wells refused to appeal his death sentence and would be executed by lethal injection in under two years from the date of his conviction on January 6 1994. Becoming the first person executed in Idaho since 1957

Keith Wells Photos

Keith Wells FAQ

When Was Keith Wells Executed

Keith Wells was executed on January 6 1994

Keith Wells Case

Idaho today executed a man who said he had beaten two people to death with a baseball bat at a bar for no reason other than that “it was time for them to die.”

The execution, by injection, was Idaho’s first in 36 years.

As the execution of the inmate, Keith Eugene Wells, 31, went ahead at the Idaho Maximum Security Institution, inmates pounded on walls and stomped on the floor in protest. And foes of the death penalty staged vigils at the State Capitol and the prison.

The United States Supreme Court had rejected an appeal filed against Mr. Wells’s wishes. The vote was 7 to 2, with Justices John Paul Stevens and Harry A. Blackmun in the minority. Mr. Wells’s lawyer, Rolf Kehne, had contended that his client was incompetent and therefore not capable of deciding whether to appeal his conviction. Mr. Wells had no final statement. But a reporter for KTVB-TV, Dee Sarton, said Mr. Wells called her at home on Wednesday night to ask her to tell his victims’ relatives that he was sorry.

Mr. Wells was convicted in the slayings of John Justad, 23, and Brandi Rains, 20, at a tavern here in 1990. He was on parole for robbery at the time and described himself that night as “a predator on the prowl for prey.”

In an interview with The Idaho Statesman, Keith Wells said he had been at the bar for about two hours when “I knew it was time for them to die.” Using a bat he had brought with him, he beat Mr. Justad, a patron, as he came out of the bathroom, and turned on Ms. Rains, a tavern employee, when she came to see what was happening.

Mr. Kehne had argued that the defense was not given adequate opportunity to establish that Mr. Wells was incompetent to stand trial. He said Mr. Wells believed that he was possessed by demons and that he would rid himself of them by dying.

The execution was the first in the nation in 1994 and Idaho’s first since Oct. 18, 1957, when Raymond Allen Snowden, a 35-year-old itinerant laborer, was hanged for the murder and mutilation of a woman he met at a bar.

Idaho reinstated the death penalty in 1977 after the Supreme allowed capital punishment to resume. It changed the method of execution to lethal injection in 1982. Twenty-one people remain on Idaho’s death row.

Paul Rhoades Executed Idaho Serial Killer

Paul Rhoades was a serial killer who was executed by the State of Idaho for three murders

According to court documents Paul Rhoades would go a killing spree that saw him murder three people in a three week period: 21-year-old Stacy Dawn Baldwin, 20-year-old Nolan Haddon and 34-year-old Susan Michelbacher

Paul Rhoades was also suspected but not charged in four additional murders

Paul Rhoades would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death

Paul Rhoades would be executed on November 18 2011 by lethal injection

Paul Rhoades Photos

Paul Rhoades FAQ

When Was Paul Rhoades Executed

Paul Rhoades was executed November 18 2011

Paul Rhoades Case

Idaho prison officials executed Paul Ezra Rhoades today for his role in the 1987 murders of two women, marking the state’s first execution in 17 years.

Rhoades, 54, was declared dead at 9:15 a.m. at the Idaho Maximum Security Institution after being administered three separate drugs that make up the state’s new lethal injection protocol.

In his final words, Rhoades apologized for one of the murders, bid goodbye to his mother, and forgave state officials for the execution.

The execution was witnessed by representatives of all three of the victims’ families, Rhoades’ mother, Pauline Rhoades, and four members of Idaho media. It appeared to go according to protocol, witnesses said.

Rhoades delivered his final statement while lying on his back, strapped to a table. He seemed antsy, occasionally tapping his hand on the table.

In a clear, loud voice, Rhoades apologized to Michelbacher’s husband for her murder but did not take responsibility for the other two slayings.

“To Bert Michelbacher, I’m sorry for the part I played in your wife’s death,” he said. Michelbacher did not attend the execution; but friends of the Michelbacher family were in attendance.

“For Haddon and for Baldwin, you still have to keep looking. I can’t help you,” Rhoades said. “I’m sorry for your family. I can’t help you.”

After that statement, Baldwin’s brother quietly said, “He lied the whole way through.”

Julie Haddon, Nolan Haddon’s mother, commented, “What a coward.”

The time from initial injection to declaration of death was 22 minutes.

Brian Edgerton, a long-time family friend of the Michelbachers, told the AP after the execution that he felt a sense of relief, as well as continued grief over Susan Michelbacher’s murder. He helped search for Michelbacher after she was reported missing, and said that everyone who knew her was devastated.

“It’s amazing how much is still there after all this time,” Edgerton said. “A psychologist said there’s always going to be a gnawing pain — it never completely heals. This helps a lot to move on and do the best we can to go forward.”

The other victims’ family members seemed to feel the same way, he said.

“I think that was felt by several of the families — a sense of peace and closure,” Edgerton said.

Paul Rhoades’ attacks on Michelbacher, Baldwin and Haddon were brutal and his death was long overdue, Edgerton said, calling the execution “the appropriate, compelling and lawful consequence of these heinous crimes.”

The killings of Michelbacher, Baldwin and Haddon occurred during a three-week span in the winter of 1987. Prosecutors said Rhoades snatched Michelbacher, a special education teacher, into his van, raped her, shot her nine times and continued the sexual assault either as she lay dying or after she was already dead.

Baldwin died in similar fashion. The newlywed and convenience store worker was abducted at gunpoint and taken to a remote area where prosecutor said he intended to sexually assault her. She fought back, and as she was scrambling away on all fours, he shot her twice and left her to die alone in the snow.

Haddon also worked at a convenience store. He had long hair, and investigators speculated that Rhoades may have mistaken him for a young woman because of his blond locks. In any case, Rhoades robbed the convenience store, shooting Haddon five times and leaving him for dead in a walk-in cooler. Haddon died several hours later.

Rhoades, an Idaho Falls native, was the first Idaho inmate to be executed since 1994 and the only person to be involuntarily put to death in the state since 1957. The last inmate to be executed gave up all of his remaining appeals and asked the state to carry out his lethal injection.

The execution was the target of protests by capital punishment activists outside the prison south of Boise.

Early Friday, about 50 people braved the cold and wind to protest at the prison’s entrance. Some of them sat on the ground in silence, while others prayed collectively and waved signs with messages such as “What Would Jesus Do?”

Across the street, about a half-dozen people gathered in a fenced-off area designated for supporters of the death penalty.

Rhoades admitted committing the murders, but he and his lawyers have vigorously appealed his case and Idaho’s new execution protocols and procedures. On Thursday, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied a request for a full judge’s panel to review their appeal, and Rhoades’ attorneys also filed a last-ditch appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. The high court cleared the way for the state to proceed

A section of the state’s protocol that barred media witnesses from viewing the first part of the execution was also subject to a separate challenge. Under the state’s procedure, media witnesses were not allowed to see the execution team bring Rhoades into the chamber, secure him or insert the IVs.

Media cited a 2002 California case in which the 9th U.S. Circuit Court ruled the public — through media representatives — had a First Amendment right to view an execution in its entirety. The Department of Correction rejected requests from various Idaho newspapers, The Associated Press and broadcast groups to change the policy in the days leading up to the execution.

Rhoades, who is a diabetic, was in fair health during his final days, though he was anxious about the coming execution, said Ray, the corrections spokesman. The department planned to cremate his body after the execution and give the remains to Rhoades’ attorney, Oliver Loewy.

Rhoades was a high school dropout who began drinking at the about the age of 10, suffered polio as a child and developed a serious methamphetamine addiction as an adult.

https://www.oregonlive.com/pacific-northwest-news/2011/11/killer_paul_ezra_rhoades_put_t.html

Richard Leavitt Executed For Danette Elg Murder

Richard Leavitt was executed by the State of Idaho for the murder of Danette Elg

According to court documents Richard Leavitt would brutally attack Danette Elg who was sexually assaulted and stabbed to death

Richard Leavitt would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death

Richard Leavitt would be executed by lethal injection on June 12 2012

Richard Leavitt Photos

Richard Leavitt FAQ

When Was Richard Leavitt Executed

Richard Leavitt was executed on June 12 2012

Richard Leavitt Case

The witnesses heard only silence when Richard Albert Leavitt entered the execution chamber on a gurney, accompanied by five corrections officers in surgical masks and black baseball caps. A few stood at attention while the others secured Leavitt to the table he would die on. He spoke to the officers as they worked, the words inaudible behind the soundproof glass, and they nodded in reply.

Leavitt was convicted in 1985 for stabbing and mutilating 31-year-old Danette Elg of Blackfoot in 1984.

A faint antiseptic, medical scent permeated the room. Leavitt’s fingers and feet fidgeted as though he was nervous, but his face appeared relaxed.
Warden Randy Blades and Idaho Department of Corrections Director Brent Reinke stood stony-faced in the chamber, dressed in black suits, supervising without words. The execution team had rehearsed twice over the weekend. They didn’t need step-by-step instructions     The silence continued as all but one of the officers left the room with military precision, and a medical team entered the chamber from the opposite side. All three wore royal blue scrubs, full head coverings, surgical masks and safety glasses. Two wore black medical caps, one wore blue. It took several minutes to attach the blood pressure monitor, EKG sensors and IV tubes — all strung through two small holes in the wall opposite the observation room — and then they too turned on their heels and left the room with military poise.

    Only then did the silence finally break.

    Blades asked Leavitt if he’d like to make a final statement, but Leavitt merely shook his head. When Blades asked if he’d like his face covered, Leavitt simply said “no.”

    That was the only time the witnesses heard him speak.

    Blades read the death warrant aloud, and Reinke called Attorney Attorney General Lawrence Wasden from the chamber telephone to confirm there was no legal reason to stop the procedure. Wasden wasn’t far away — he entered the observation room and joined the witnesses immediately after Reinke hung up.

    “Commence the execution, and administer the chemical,” Blades said. Leavitt visibly swallowed and adjusted his head on the table. Over the next several seconds, his breathing became increasingly shallow, then stopped altogether.
 Then, silence.

    For 20 minutes, witnesses, officers and staff waited as Leavitt’s motionless face and hands turned gradually but noticeably gray. Finally, Ada County Coroner Erwin Sonnenburg entered the chamber. He placed a stethoscope on Leavitt’s abdomen, then examined his face with a flashlight.

    “Warden, I pronounce him at 10:25,” Sonnenburg said.

    Seconds later, corrections officers escorted the witnesses to the facility’s administration building.

    It was the second execution in less than a year witnessed by Post-Register reporter Ruth Brown, and the first she saw from beginning to end. It was a different experience, she said, and an important one. When she watched the execution of Paul Ezra Rhoades last November, the condemned man was already secured to the table when she entered, the IVs already inserted.

    “I think it’s beneficial to see the medical staff come in and hook him up to IVs,” Brown said after the media debriefing. “People ask me a lot what it’s like to see an execution, because human beings in general are curious, and I use the word ‘clinical’ a lot. It’s not dramatic.”

    For KBOI-TV2’s reporter Scott Logan, it was a first. He’s seen violence, he said, when working as a reporter in South America. But never before had he seen death so carefully-planned and orchestrated. The emotional charge was palpable, he said, but the staff’s professionalism throughout left him impressed. Leavitt’s quiet passing, he added, was perhaps a stark contrast to the violent, likely noisy death of Leavitt’s victim Danette Elg.
“I was struck by the military precision with which the escort team brought him into this chamber,” Logan said. “And with the way it was carried out. I didn’t see anything to suggest any problems.”

https://www.idahostatejournal.com/news/local/murderer-executed-leavitt-put-to-death-for-vicious-killing-of-danette-elg/article_b72486d8-b51d-11e1-9d6a-0019bb2963f4.html

Jonathan Renfro Murders Officer In Idaho

Jonathan Renfro was sentenced to death by the State of Idaho for the murder of a police officer

According to court documents Jonathan Renfro was approached by Coeur d’Alene Police Sergeant Greg Moore who was investigating a suspicious person. When Moore was about to question Renfro he was fatally shot

Jonathan Renfro was arrested, convicted and sentenced to death

Jonathan Renfro Photos

Jonathan Renfro FAQ

Where Is Jonathan Renfro Now

Jonathan Renfro is incarcerated at Idaho Maximum Security Institution

Jonathan Renfro Case

A jury has unanimously decided that a 29-year-old man who shot and killed a northern Idaho police officer should be sentenced to death.

The 12-member panel reached the decision Saturday morning

The same jury last month found Jonathan Renfro guilty of first-degree murder for the May 2015 killing of Coeur d’Alene Police Sgt. Greg Moore. He was also found guilty of robbery, removing a firearm from a police officer and concealment of evidence.

The mitigation phase of the trial began Monday and concluded Friday afternoon with defense attorneys arguing why Renfro shouldn’t get the death penalty. The jury was sequestered while reaching its decision.

During the trial, jurors watched a video of the shooting recorded by Moore’s body camera. Moore was checking on a suspicious person while patrolling a neighborhood when he was gunned down, court documents say. He died later that evening.

“Renfro is observed shooting Sgt. Moore,” a detective wrote in an affidavit that describes images from the camera worn by Moore. “After being shot, Sgt. Moore falls to the ground, causing his body camera to point skyward. A short time later, Renfro’s face comes back into the frame. Renfro is seen using a flashlight while searching Sgt. Moore’s person.”

Later, authorities said, an officer from nearby Post Falls, Idaho who was listening to radio traffic about the shooting, saw a Coeur d’Alene police car race by at about 90 mph, so he gave chase close to the Washington state line.

The officer found the patrol car abandoned, and the Washington State Patrol and Kootenai County Sheriff’s Office helped set up a perimeter. A police dog found Renfro about two hours later hiding under a tractor-trailer.

Renfro has a long criminal record and was on probation at the time of the shooting. During the trial, prosecutors said Renfro feared going back to jail if Moore discovered that he was illegally carrying a firearm. So Renfro used the firearm to kill Moore, they said.

Renfro’s sentencing hearing is scheduled for Monday in 1st District Court.

Moore, the son of a police officer, was a husband and father of two and a 16-year veteran of the city police department. He began his career as a deputy sheriff in Asotin County, Washington, in late 1997 and started in Coeur d’Alene in 1999.

https://www.police1.com/arrests-sentencing/articles/idaho-jury-votes-for-death-penalty-after-officer-killed-ltARIiUmZTaZrKpR/