For nearly five decades, the staff at Idaho’s prison have been providing Thomas Eugene Creech with three meals daily, conducting regular check-ins, and ensuring his attendance at medical appointments.
This Wednesday, a portion of Idaho’s prison staff will be tasked with executing him, unless there’s a last-minute stay. At 73, Creech stands as one of the nation’s longest-serving death row inmates, slated for lethal injection due to the 1981 murder of fellow prisoner David Jensen, committed with a battery-filled sock.
Jensen’s killing was the final act in Creech’s extensive criminal history, which resulted in convictions for five murders across three states. He is also suspected of involvement in at least half a dozen other cases.
However, within the walls of the Idaho Maximum Security Institution, Creech is commonly known as “Tom” – an elderly inmate who generally behaves well and has a fondness for poetry.
Surprisingly, his plea for clemency garnered support from a former warden, prison staff who received poems of encouragement or sympathy from him, and even the judge who handed down the death sentence.
Josh Tewalt, director of the Idaho Department of Correction, stated on Friday, “Some of our correctional officers have grown up with Tom Creech. Our warden has a long-standing relationship with him. … There’s a familiarity and a rapport that has been built over time.”
Creech’s legal team has submitted numerous last-minute appeals in the past few months across four different courts, seeking to prevent his execution, which would mark Idaho’s first in 12 years.
They argue that Idaho’s refusal to disclose the source of the execution drug infringes upon his rights and that he received inadequate legal representation.
A three-judge panel from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected a claim on Friday that Creech should be spared from execution because a judge, not a jury, sentenced him.
The exact number of individuals Creech, originally from Ohio, killed before his 1974 imprisonment in Idaho remains unclear.
While he once claimed responsibility for up to 50 killings, many of these confessions were made under the influence of now discredited “truth serum” drugs, often involving fantastical stories of occult-driven human sacrifice and contract killings for a powerful motorcycle gang.
Although official estimates vary, authorities typically focus on 11 deaths. Creech’s legal representatives did not respond immediately to calls from The Associated Press.
In 1973, Creech stood trial for the murder of 70-year-old Paul Schrader, who was fatally stabbed in a Tucson, Arizona motel where Creech resided. Using Schrader’s credit cards and vehicle, Creech left Tucson for Portland, Oregon. Although acquitted by a jury, authorities express certainty about his culpability.
The following year, Creech was briefly committed to Oregon State Hospital. During a weekend pass, he traveled to Sacramento, California, where he murdered Vivian Grant Robinson in her home.
Creech then used Robinson’s phone to inform the hospital of his delayed return. This crime remained unsolved until Creech confessed while in custody in Idaho, leading to his conviction in 1980.
Following his discharge from the Oregon State Hospital, Creech obtained employment performing maintenance duties at a Portland church. In 1974, he shot and killed William Joseph Dean, a 22-year-old, in the church where he was living. Then, according to the authorities, he shot Sandra Jane Ramsamooj dead at her place of employment, the Salem grocery store.
The arrest of Creech came about in November 1974. In Idaho, he was hitchhiking with a girlfriend when two painters, Thomas Arnold and John Bradford, picked them up. Creech killed both guys with a gunshot, and the girlfriend assisted the police.
In detention, Creech admitted to several more murders. Though some seemed made up, he gave police information that helped them find the bodies of 22-year-old Rick Stewart McKenzie near Baggs, Wyoming, and Gordon Lee Stanton and Charles Thomas Miller near Las Vegas.
At first, Creech received a death sentence for the painters’ murders. Nevertheless, his sentence was changed to life in prison in 1976 when the US Supreme Court struck down automatic death penalties.
After he killed Jensen, who was incarcerated for auto theft, that changed. Jensen’s life had not been easy: as a teenager, he was shot almost fatally, leaving him severely disabled, including partially paralyzed.
The family of Jensen was against Creech’s request for mercy. They called Jensen “the peanut butter” to his sister’s jelly, a kindhearted joker who enjoyed the great outdoors and hunting. His four-year-old daughter expressed how she never had the chance to meet him and felt it was unjust that Creech was still alive but her father had passed away.
Conversely, Creech’s admirers assert that his decades-long incarceration have transformed him. Last month, a staff member on death row told the parole board that although she cannot fathom the pain Creech caused others, he has since transformed into a productive member of his community.
She stated that everyone at the prison, especially those who have known him for years, will find his execution date tough.
