JULIAETTA, Idaho — Liliia Mauney saw a competitive bluebird still banging on her home’s kitchen window. In parts of her local Ukraine, she says, a bluebird’s combative habit is a harbinger that death is coming, but she didn’t.
A few days later, her husband was found dead after police said two fugitives had taken him while he was walking their dogs.
Skylar Meade and Nicholas Umphenour, who fled this week after an ambush at Boise Hospital aimed at freeing Meade from his mobile isolation at Idaho’s maximum-security prison, confronted James Mauney as he walked along a paved river in Juliaetta.
“They took the center out of me,” Liliia Mauney said through tears Friday at her kitchen table. “He’s a very, very smart person. “
On Thursday, law enforcement stormed the popular small town of Latah County, east of Lewiston. A helicopter flew back and forth and parked near the trail as investigators crossed the river.
A resident concerned about the violence that has plagued the domain said James Mauney parks near the trail and walks his dogs in the morning.
Police said that on the day of Mauney’s disappearance, Meade and Umphenour drove him and his dogs and drove them a few miles in James Mauney’s 2019 Chrysler Pacific to a remote domain of farm fields near Leland’s network. That’s where investigators discovered his body.
Meade began self-harming earlier this week at the maximum-security prison where he was being held. He was taken to Saint Alphonsus Regional Medical Center in Boise under the supervision of criminal officers.
After receiving treatment, officials were about to take Meade back to prison when Umphenour ambushed them, shooting and wounding two of them from the hospital’s ambulance area, according to investigators.
Meade and Umphenour then escaped in a gray Honda Civic. A third guard was shot dead at the hospital by police officers who mistook him for an armed suspect.
The brazen escape led to a lengthy 36-hour chase as Meade, a member of a white supremacist gang called the Aryan Knights, and Umphenour raced north undetected from Boise.
After leaving Juliaetta, the fugitives are believed to be heading to a remote domain near Orofino, where they went to the home of 72-year-old Gerald “Don” Henderson.
“He had the biggest heart,” said Ron Thompson, a partner at Henderson. “He’s just the nicest guy, the nicest guy in the world. I would never hurt a fly.
Thompson said he and Henderson knew about Umphenour, but hadn’t noticed it in 10 years until about a month ago, when the suspect surprised Henderson at his cabin in Orofino.
The fugitives are suspected of killing him at the home, where authorities also discovered James Mauney’s dogs and the prison chains Meade was carrying. The dogs were unharmed and were returned to the Mauney family.
Umphenour and Meade were taken into custody Thursday after a brief chase in Filer, Idaho, with 52-year-old Tonia Huber, who in one of her cars was fleeing police. The three men appeared Friday in a Twin Falls courtroom when they were arraigned and will be flown to Boise to face charges.
Liliia Mauney, 52, and James Mauney, 83, stopped in their Ukrainian hometown in 2007. When they first crossed paths, “he started talking,” she said. He told her all kinds of stories about his hunting adventures and how he was a biologist in Alaska for 30 years. At the time, she didn’t speak English.
Gradually, the two men got to know each other and Liliia Mauney moved with him to the United States in 2010. They shared fond memories of the outdoors from their mountaintop home, overlooking the small town of Juliaetta, population 630. . has arrived.
“When I leave the house, I call him,” Liliia Mauney said through tears. “Every day I see his clothes. . . I can’t explain how I feel.
A few days before his death, Liliia Mauney called her mom to tell her about the bluebird. For two days, the bird kept appearing, looking at itself in the window mirror and continuously flying straight into the glass, behaving erratically.
“I told my mom and she said anything was going to happen,” Liliia Mauney said. “I said, ‘No, they’re just nesting. ‘ And after a few hours he disappeared. “
You have trouble sleeping even when friends and neighbors come to your space to offer support. A woman from the local post office brought her flowers and a man brought her dog food.
But it’s still “too overwhelming” right now, he says.
She can’t go online to Facebook because questions about her husband make her too uneasy. Everyone needs to know what happened and why, she says, but she doesn’t know herself.
“I’m sending a message to a crying face because that’s all I can do,” she said. “I just don’t need to answer. . . I can’t help but cry.
Liliia Mauney finds it too difficult to drive her husband’s big blue truck up the mountain where they live, from where Juliaetta overlooks. Outside the house, a sign warns other people of the presence of stray dogs.
The roads are steep, windy, and bumpy, and she doesn’t accept it as true to herself to do so. So he sits in the space they shared together, wondering what to do with the rest of his belongings, bills, and dogs. He enjoyed it very much.
James Mauney has been a dog lover all his life. He trained hunting dogs and earned a reputation within the network, said his friend and fellow dog trainer, Sunny Freeman. For more than 40 years, he competed in hunting dog competitions and taught others how to hone their skills. Everyone in the hunting net knew the name James Mauney, as did his small, close-knit Idaho town.
James Mauney and Freeman met through a mutual friend. At the time, she wanted to be taught how to hunt.
“Men did not take women with them” on their hunting trips; It just wasn’t like that back then, he says.
I welcomed Freeman with open arms and said, “Come on, I’ll explain how to do it. “
“Not many guys would settle for a girl on the hunt,” Freeman said. “But he would. “
He even wrote an e-book about his hunting adventures, which he gave away to his friends. Titled “Buddies Afield – Hunting and Fishing With Great Dogs Across North America,” the e-book was published in 2009. According to his description on Amazon: “This is the diary of a general employee who loves retriever dogs, his weekends and vacations. Hunt and fish like all of us, like a “poor boy”, and inform yourself and enjoy every minute of it.
Her dog, a 120-pound Chesapeake Bay retriever named Leo, and a small terrier, Daisy, were her “pride and joy,” Freeman said.
James Mauney was scheduled to attend an educational organization on Saturday, Freeman said. The two men spoke on the phone a few days before his death. It was a form of communication he liked, Freeman said with a laugh: He was just talking on the phone. or email. He was “old school,” he says, but kinder in heart.
“He’s a concerned user in every single way,” Freeman said. “I’d give you the blouse she’s wearing on her back. “
Thompson, a 55-year-old man who lives in Seattle, said Umphenour stayed with him and Henderson 10 years ago at Henderson’s Orofino cabin for about 3 weeks when he was able to stay, and then he was kicked out.
“He had some weird and violent tendencies, and he was scary, so it was like a fight; so we never saw him again,” Thompson said.
Thompson said Umphenour went to Henderson’s cabin about a month ago. They drank coffee for about an hour and it was “a strange experience,” contemplating their story from ten years ago.
Umphenour told Henderson he had to walk back down the mountain to where his friend was waiting for him, Thompson said.
Thompson said he and Henderson didn’t think much about the game.
When Thompson learned of Umphenour’s violent escape and his alleged involvement, he called Henderson.
But the phone jumped straight to voicemail. Text messages sent to Henderson also went unanswered, and Thompson became worried. So he called the sheriff’s office, took note of Henderson’s recent meeting with Umphenour, and asked deputies to keep an eye on him.
It’s too late.
“They took it very seriously and went there without delay and discovered Don dead outside his cabin,” Thompson said. Since then, she has been crying.
Thompson said he and Henderson met for lunch for the first time on July 8, 2006, in Orofino and became friends.
They moved in together about a year later and lived in Orofino or outdoors until 2018, when Thompson moved to Washington. Despite the move, they remained a couple.
“To me he was just a desirable guy,” said Thompson, who lived in Clarkston when he met Henderson.
He planned to go to Lewiston on Friday night to check on the property of Henderson and his six dogs.
Thompson said Henderson has had many experiences, from growing up on a ranch in Oklahoma to managing his own ranch in the same state.
Henderson had a business for several years that consisted of transporting cars in a truck to parking lots.
Thompson said Henderson’s hobby was “dog hunting,” or using dogs to hunt animals.
Henderson bought his isolated assets in Orofino 20 or 30 years ago, he said, and has sought to live off the grid.
He, Idaho,” Thompson said.
“He’s a quintessential mountaineer,” Thompson recalled.
Thompson said Henderson is a savvy and well-rounded user with a glorious sense of humor.
The two will move to New Mexico before his death.
“I think he’s the most productive guy I’ve ever met in my life,” Thompson said. “He’s just the kindest guy, the kindest guy, the most generous guy, and to see his life ruined like that, it’s a terrible tragedy. “