An escaped inmate and his accomplice commit two homicides while on the lam, after shooting two correctional officers during prison break.
Escaped inmate caught after manhunt
Both escaped inmate Skylar Meade and Nicholas Umphenour were apprehended in Twin Falls, Idaho, after engaging police in a brief car chase 36 hours after fleeing from prison.
31-year-old Meade is serving a two-decade tenure for an armed confrontation with law enforcement during another car chase.
He exhibited self-harming behavior on Tuesday night while he was locked up in a maximum-security cell, and whatever Meade did to injure himself was damaging enough to require a visit to a local hospital.
After he was treated, correctional guards were escorting Meade back to prison, when they were ambushed by Umphenour at the hospital.
According to police, he shot two of Meade’s guards, and the pair fled off into the night.
When police responded, one of the officers shot at a reportedly armed individual at the hospital entrance, who was later determined to be one of the correctional officers assigned to Meade’s detail.
The officer did not sustain life-threatening injuries from the mishap, and neither did one of the guards shot by Umphenour. The other was in critical but stable condition after the shooting, and remains hospitalized.
A state-wide manhunt ensued after Meade and Umphenour, who were both identified as members of prison gang the Aryan Knights, took off in a Honda Accord at around 2:15 a.m. on Wednesday.
Escaped inmate went on murder spree
They reportedly went on a violent crime spree that included two separate homicides in two different locations.
The men are suspected of the crimes because they weren’t exactly subtle while committing additional offenses.
The handcuffs Meade was wearing during his prison break were found at the scene of one of the homicides, and they ditched their original ride in favor of stealing a car from one of their victims.
Police located the two men, along with a woman, Tonia Huber, after they got into a car chase with pursuing officers at 2 p.m. on Thursday.
The suspects were taken into custody without trying to shoot their way out of the situation, so the police did not have to use extensive force against them.
Huber was charged with possession of a controlled substance and eluding authorities, but police are still investigating both her involvement and the homicides they believe are linked to the suspects.
The extent of Meade and Umphenour’s association is unknown at this point, but the latter was previously incarcerated at the same facility from Dec. 29, 2022, to Jan. 17, 2024.
“What we know, with near certainty, this was not an accident,” Josh Tewalt, the director of the Corrections Department, remarked about the violent prison break.
“This was a planned event. And we’re channeling every resource we have into trying to understand exactly how they went about planning it.”
Meade was sentenced to aggravated battery in 2016, and was not set to be released until 2036. The amount of time his homicidal stint on the outside will add to his time in prison has yet to be determined.
