Wood River Valley friends of John Henry McElhiney were shocked when he was arrested in Twin Falls last September for killing an 18-year-old man. They were shocked further when McElhiney admitted to the murder earlier this week.
McElhiney, a former Hailey man, described by friends as jovial, well-liked and charitable, who dressed as Santa Claus for Christmas parties and sold cars at Sawtooth Auto Sales in Hailey. But McElhiney was also a narcotics informant in Blaine County who killed the man by asphyxiation and stuffed his body in a barrel.
McElhiney, who previously denied his part in the murder, confessed on Monday to killing Dale Miller, whose body was found on Sept. 12 in the sealed barrel in a garage at the apartment where McElhiney was living on Morningside Drive in east Twin Falls.
"It was known pretty early, but he finally admitted it," said Twin Falls County Prosecuting Attorney Grant Loebs.
McElhiney, 32, pleaded guilty as part of a plea agreement with prosecutors.
"He pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and the agreement is he will do 22 years in prison and up to life," Loebs told the Idaho Mountain Express on Thursday.
Sentencing is scheduled for Sept. 15.
Prosecutors and investigators had previously declined to discuss how Miller was killed, but McElhiney confessed to asphyxiating the man.
"I don't really want to go into detail on that, but what he said was accurate when he pleaded guilty," Loebs said.
McElhiney's alleged accomplice, Cameron Watts, a Gooding man who was 29 at the time of the murder, has pleaded not guilty and is scheduled for trial on Oct. 21.
Loebs declined to say if Watts allegedly participated in the actual killing of Miller.
"He's charged with the same charge that McElhiney was," Loebs said. "It's felony murder. The charge says that during a kidnapping he was killed and that's why it's charged that way."
Loebs said he is not aware that Miller's murder had anything to do with McElhiney's drug informant activities with the Blaine County Narcotics Enforcement Team, which is often referred to as NET.
Steve Harkins, a detective for the Blaine County Sheriff's Office and the director of NET, acknowledged last December that McElhiney assisted the team with narcotics busts.
"He was a former confidential informant," Harkins said Wednesday. "He worked with us on a number of investigations over the past several years."
Most recently, McElhiney assisted NET in an investigation of methamphetamine coming into the Wood River Valley from Oregon. Busted in that operation was Steve R. Sanders, a 29-year-old Oregon man who was bringing large quantities of the drug to the valley.
The sale that landed Sanders in prison was for $3,000 in the spring of 2007 to an undercover NET officer. Sanders was sentenced to six years in prison last November.
Many of McElhiney's friends were unaware of his involvement in drug circles and with the NET.
Friends describe him as well-known, well-liked, friendly, loyal, jovial and charitable. He was always willing to help his friends and even strangers in need.
At Christmas time McElhiney dressed as Santa Claus for get-togethers with his friends and was described as the life of the party.
McElhiney was a longtime Hailey resident, but several weeks before the murder of Miller he mysteriously disappeared from the Wood River Valley. His apartment in Hailey was simply abandoned and friends didn't know his whereabouts until they read or heard news media accounts about his arrest.
Why he mysteriously disappeared is unknown. One rumor has it that he fled because of threats against his life because he was a drug informant. Another says that local police were after him.
McElhiney had a previous felony conviction for car theft. He was arrested in Blaine County last August on a warrant out of Elmore County charging him with failure to appear on an invalid driver's license warrant. A misdemeanor warrant was issued for him out of Blaine County in early September charging him with failure to pay fines.
In any event, he turned up in Twin Falls, murdered Miller and was arrested.
"I wish he'd stayed a Hailey guy," said Loebs.
John Henry McElhiney
