'They took away my heart': Loved ones cherish memories of victims allegedly slain by fugitives after Idaho prison escape

Mar. 22—JULIAETTA, Idaho — Liliia Mauney noticed an aggressive bluebird continuing to strike her home's kitchen window. In areas of her native Ukraine, she said, a bluebird's combative behavior is an omen signaling that death is coming — but she didn't believe it.

Just days later, her husband was found dead after police say he was taken by two fugitives while walking his dogs.

Skylar Meade and Nicholas Umphenour, both on the run earlier this week after a Boise hospital ambush meant to break Meade out of his solitary cell at the Idaho Maximum Security prison, confronted James Mauney while he walked on a paved river trail in Juliaetta.

"They took away my heart," Liliia Mauney said through tears at her kitchen table on Friday. "He was a good, good person."

Law enforcement agencies on Thursday swarmed the popular site in the small Latah County town east of Lewiston. A helicopter flew back and forth and parked near the trail as investigators fanned out across the river.

A resident fearful of the violence that descended on the area said James Mauney would often park near the trail and walk his dogs in the mornings.

Police said that on the day of James Mauney's disappearance, Meade and Umphenour took him and his dogs and drove them a few miles in James Mauney's 2019 Chrysler Pacific to a remote area of farm fields near the community of Leland. That's where searchers found his body.

Meade began cutting himself earlier this week at the maximum security prison where he was being held. He was taken to Boise's Saint Alphonsus Regional Medical Center under guard by corrections officers.

After he was treated, the officers were about to escort Meade back to prison when Umphenour ambushed them, shooting and injuring two of them from the ambulance bay of the hospital, according to investigators.

Meade and Umphenour then escaped in a gray Honda Civic. A third guard was shot at the hospital by responding police officers who mistook him as an armed suspect.

The brazen escape led to a massive 36-hour manhunt as Meade, a member of a white supremacist prison gang called the Aryan Knights, and Umphenour sped north undetected from Boise.

After leaving Juliaetta, the fugitives are suspected of driving to a secluded area near Orofino where they went to the home of 72-year-old Gerald "Don" Henderson.

"He had the biggest heart," said Ron Thompson, Henderson's partner. "He was just the nicest guy, the sweetest man in the world. Would never harm a fly."

Thompson said he and Henderson knew Umphenour, but they hadn't seen him in 10 years until about a month ago when the suspect surprised Henderson at his Orofino cabin.

The fugitives are suspected of killing him at the home, where law enforcement also found James Mauney's dogs and the prison shackles that Meade had been wearing. The dogs were not harmed and have been returned to the Mauney family.

Umphenour and Meade were apprehended Thursday after a brief chase in Filer, Idaho, along with 52-year-old Tonia Huber, who was in one of their vehicles as they were allegedly running from police. The three appeared in a Twin Falls courtroom on Friday as they were arraigned and will be transferred to Boise to face charges.

'I still call to him'

Liliia Mauney, 52, and James Mauney, 83, met when he visited her Ukrainian hometown in 2007. When they first crossed paths, "he just started talking," she said. He told her all sorts of stories about his hunting adventures and how he used to be a biologist in Alaska for 30 years. At the time, she couldn't speak English.

Slowly, the two were acquainted, and Liliia Mauney moved to the United States with him in 2010. They shared fond memories of the outdoors from their home atop a mountain, overlooking the small town of Juliaetta, population 630. She can't believe what has happened.

"When I come out of the house, I still call to him," Liliia Mauney said as she cried. "Every day, I see his clothes. ... I can't explain what I am feeling."

Days before he was slain, Liliia Mauney called her mother to tell her about the bluebird. For two days, the bird continued to show up, eyeing itself in the reflection of the window and repeatedly flying straight into the glass, behaving erratically.

"I told my mom, and she said something will happen," Liliia Mauney said. "I said, 'No, they just come to nest.' And after a couple hours, he disappeared."

She is struggling to sleep even as friends and neighbors come to her home to offer their support. A woman from the local post office brought her flowers and a man brought over dog food.

But it's still "too overwhelming" right now, she said.

She can't bring herself to log into Facebook, because the questions about her husband are too upsetting. Everyone wants to know what happened and why, she said, but she doesn't even know herself.

"I (message) a crying face because that's all I can do," she said. "I just don't want to reply. ... I can't stop crying."

It's too challenging for Liliia Mauney to drive her husband's big blue truck down the mountain they live on, which overlooks Juliaetta. Outside the home, a sign warns people of roaming dogs.

The roads are steep, windy and bumpy, and she doesn't trust herself to do it. So she sits in the home they shared together, pondering what to do with the rest of his things, with the bills and with the dogs he loved so much.

James Mauney had been a dog lover all his life. He trained hunting dogs and built a name for himself within the community, said his friend and fellow dog trainer Sunny Freeman. For more than 40 years, he entered hunting-dog competitions and taught others how to sharpen their skills. Everyone in the hunting community knew the name of James Mauney, and so did his small-town, tight-knit Idaho community.

James Mauney and Freeman met through a mutual friend. At the time, she wanted to learn how to hunt.

"Guys didn't bring women along" on their hunting trips — it just wasn't that way back then, she said.

Not for James Mauney. He welcomed Freeman with open arms and told her, "C'mon, I'll teach you how."

"Not a lot of guys would take a lady hunting," Freeman said. "But he would."

He even wrote a book about his hunting adventures, which he'd give out to his friends. Titled "Buddies Afield — Hunting and Fishing With Great Dogs Across North America," the book was published in 2009. According to its description on Amazon: "It's the diary of a normal working guy who likes retriever dogs, using his weekends and vacation time to hunt and fish like the rest of us, 'poor-boy' style, and learning and enjoying every minute of it."

His hunting dog, a 120-pound Chesapeake Bay retriever named Leo, and a little terrier, Daisy, were his "pride and joy," Freeman said.

James Mauney was supposed to travel for a training group on Saturday, Freeman said. The two spoke over the phone days before his death. That was a preferred method of communication for him, Freeman said as she laughed — he would only talk over his house phone or through email. He was "old school," she said, but with the kindest heart.

"He was an all-around caring person," Freeman said. "He would give you the shirt off his back."

'A renaissance man'

Thompson, a 55-year-old who lives in Seattle, said Umphenour stayed with him and Henderson 10 years ago at Henderson's Orofino cabin for about three weeks when he needed a place to stay, then they kicked him out.

"He had really strange, violent tendencies, and he was frightening, so it was kind of a falling out; so we never saw him again," Thompson said.

Thompson said Umphenour hiked to Henderson's cabin about a month ago. They had coffee for about an hour and that it was "a really strange experience," given their history from a decade ago.

Umphenour told Henderson he needed to hike back down the mountain to his friend who was waiting for him, Thompson said.

Thompson said he and Henderson didn't think much about the encounter.

When Thompson heard about the violent escape and Umphenour's alleged involvement, he immediately called Henderson.

But the phone went right to voicemail. Text messages to Henderson went unanswered as well, and Thompson grew worried. So he called the sheriff's office, noted Henderson's recent encounter with Umphenour, and asked that deputies check on him.

It was too late.

"They took that very seriously and went up there immediately and found Don dead outside of his cabin," Thompson said. He has been crying since.

Thompson said he and Henderson first met for lunch on July 8, 2006, in Orofino, and became best friends.

They moved in together about a year later and lived in or outside Orofino until 2018 when Thompson moved to Washington. Despite the move, they remained in a relationship.

"He was just a fascinating man to me," said Thompson, who was living in Clarkston when he met Henderson.

He was planning to fly to Lewiston on Friday night to check on Henderson's property and six dogs.

Thompson said Henderson had so many life experiences, from growing up on an Oklahoma ranch and running his own ranch in the same state.

Henderson had a business for several years that entailed hauling cars on a semitruck to various car lots.

Thompson said Henderson's passion was "hound hunting," or using dogs to hunt animals.

Henderson bought his remote Orofino property 20 or 30 years ago, he said, and always wanted to live off the grid.

He loved Idaho, Thompson said.

"He was a quintessential mountain man," Thompson recalled. "He would probably call himself a renaissance man."

Thompson said Henderson was a well-rounded, knowledgeable individual with a wonderful sense of humor.

The two had plans to move to New Mexico before his death.

"I think he's the best man I'd ever known in my life," Thompson said. "He was just the kindest man, the kindest man, the most giving man, and to have his life snuffed out like this, it's a horrible tragedy."