Teen will face murder charge as adult

The 16-year-old boy suspected along with his father of the home invasion and shooting death of Samuel Johns in January will stand trial as an adult on a charge of first-degree murder, a judge ordered Tuesday.

Nez Perce County Magistrate Judge Michelle Evans found there was probable cause that Demetri X. Ewing was one of the two people who rode bikes from a Clarkston motel in the early morning hours of Jan. 8 to 1706 Seventh Ave. in Lewiston, broke in, shot Johns, then rode back to the motel. Evans made her ruling after a four-hour preliminary hearing at the Nez Perce County Courthouse.

Magistrate Judge Sunil Ramalingam made the same determination Friday after a preliminary hearing for Ewing’s father, Clyde K. Ewing, 43. Nez Perce County Prosecutor Justin Coleman confirmed Tuesday that his office may file a motion to join the two cases since the evidence against each suspect is identical and the state will rely on the testimony of the same witnesses.

And while Coleman and Chief Criminal Deputy Prosecutor April Smith presented much of the same material at Tuesday’s hearing, Ewing’s attorney, Greg Rauch, sometimes took a different approach than Clyde Ewing’s attorney, Rick Cuddihy. Early in the hearing, Rauch challenged the credibility of Patricia Labombard, who testified that two people dressed head-to-toe in dark clothing broke into Johns’ home that night. One held her at gunpoint and attempted to restrain her with zip ties while the shooting happened in another room.

Labombard testified that she, Johns and two other people were smoking marijuana in the hours leading up to the shooting, and Rauch questioned whether she could rely on her memory. Labombard said she could.

“I have an extremely high tolerance,” she said, noting that she is 29 and has been using marijuana since she was 11 and didn’t consider herself to be intoxicated. “It takes a lot for me.”

Rauch also asked Labombard about her statements to police on the day of the shooting that the person who held her at gunpoint sounded like a young girl and was 5 or 6 inches taller than her. Demetri Ewing is approximately 5 feet, 3 inches tall, while Labombard said she is 5 feet, 2 inches tall.

Lewiston Police Department Detective Brian Erickson presented a key piece of evidence for the prosecution, an Idaho State Police crime lab report that determined that a 9 mm shell casing found in a backpack in the Ewings’ motel room was fired from the same gun as two shell casings found at the murder scene.

Rauch objected to the admission of that report, noting that the casings were tested for fingerprints, then cleaned with acetone before being sent to the lab. He said that treatment made the ISP testing unreliable, but Evans noted that the lab’s conclusions amounted to sworn testimony and overruled the objection.

In making her ruling, Evans found that residential and commercial video surveillance camera footage compiled by Lewiston police appeared to show a cohesive progression and timeline of two darkly dressed individuals leaving the vicinity of the Ewings’ motel room on bikes, arriving near the murder scene, then leaving shortly after two loud bangs can be heard on one clip.

Rauch tried to challenge that video evidence, contending that it was impossible to tell who was riding the bikes. But Evans noted that one person appeared to be wearing a dark backpack in several of the clips, that the two consistently rode together, and that riding bikes in the middle of the night is not a common activity.

“It didn’t appear that there was a plethora of bike riders out at that time in the morning,” Evans said.

She noted the testimony of the manager of the Hacienda Lodge, who identified the Ewings as residents there for about three months. Evans agreed that the video compilation seemed to show that the people riding the bikes on the night of the murder began and ended their trip from near their room.

The judge also pointed to testimony from Clyde Ewing’s brother, Christopher Higheagle, about a burglary at his home on New Year’s Eve where his 9 mm handgun, several ammunition magazines and a backpack containing survival items were stolen. Higheagle later identified the pack and its contents recovered by police in the motel room as the missing items, although a murder weapon has never been found.

Higheagle also testified that Clyde Ewing was extremely upset about an army bag that was owned by their late father that had gone missing. Someone spray-painted the word “bag” on Higheagle’s home and car, as well as Johns’ home and a vehicle parked there. Cans of the same neon pink and green shades of spray paint were recovered from the Hacienda room, according to police.

“There seems to be an obsession with seeking this bag,” Evans said.

The prosecution alleged that robbery was a possible motive for the home invasion. Evans set an arraignment for Demetri Ewing at 9 a.m. today before 2nd District Judge Jeff Brudie. Clyde Ewing’s arraignment is set for Thursday before 2nd District Judge Jay Gaskill.

Mills may be contacted at jmills@lmtribune.com or at (208) 310-1901, ext. 2266.