Boise prison escapee, facing death penalty, charged in second killing of North Idaho man

An inmate who brazenly bolted from a Boise-area prison last year and is accused of killing a man during his escape is now facing another murder charge in connection to the statewide spree.

Prosecutors this month charged Skylar Meade, a 33-year-old white supremacist gang member, with the murder of 72-year-old Gerald “Don” Henderson at his Orofino cabin in March of last year. Henderson was shot in the head, court records say.

Henderson, known by his partner as a “mountain man” who loved Idaho, was killed in the same 24 hours as 83-year-old James Mauney from Juliaetta, Idaho.

Investigators believe Meade and his 29-year-old accomplice, Nicholas Umphenour, took Mauney’s car as he was walking his dogs and drove him to an area near Leland. Police found his body in a remote farm field.

Both killings followed Meade’s violent prison escape that prompted a 36-hour manhunt in 2024.

Meade began cutting himself in prison and was transported to Boise’s Saint Alphonsus Regional Medical Center for treatment.

Following treatment, corrections officers began the steps to take Meade back to prison. That’s when Umphenour appeared in the emergency department’s ambulance bay and began shooting at the officers, injuring two of them, as part of a plan to free Meade from custody. Both fled the hospital in a car and drove north, police said at the time.

Investigators suspect that after Mauney was killed, the two fugitives drove to Henderson’s cabin. Henderson’s partner, Ron Thompson, said Henderson and Umphenour knew each other from many years ago when Umphenour needed a place to stay. But it wasn’t long until Henderson kicked him out for “violent tendencies,” Thompson told The Spokesman-Review last year.

When Thompson heard Umphenour was accused of breaking Meade out of prison, he immediately called his partner. He got no response. Thompson called the sheriff’s office to warn them and ask they check on Henderson, but it was too late.

“They took that very seriously and went up there immediately and found Don dead outside of his cabin,” Thompson said last year.

Mauney’s missing dogs were found at Henderson’s cabin along with prison shackles believed to belong to Meade, according to reporting from The Spokesman-Review.

Meade and Umphenour pleaded guilty to charges in connection to the prison escape last year. Both were sentenced to life in prison for their respective roles in the crime.

When Meade was later charged with the first-degree murder of Mauney, he chose to remain silent during his plea. A not guilty plea was entered on his behalf. Prosecutors also chose to seek the death penalty last year against Meade and Umphenour over Mauney’s killing, calling it “senseless and random.”

Umphenour had not been charged in Henderson’s death as of Monday.