{"id":5831,"date":"2011-04-08T20:19:43","date_gmt":"2011-04-09T03:19:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lewiscountysirens.com\/?p=5831"},"modified":"2011-04-08T20:19:43","modified_gmt":"2011-04-09T03:19:43","slug":"tenino-trail-murder-judge-sentences-27-year-old-to-26-plus-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/?p=5831","title":{"rendered":"Tenino trail murder: Judge sentences 27-year-old to 26-plus years"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"2011.0407.howell.sentence.trim.copy\"<\/a>

Bernard K. Howell III sits with his lawyers, Robert Jimerson, left, and Patrick O'Connor in Thurston County Superior Court.<\/p><\/div>\n

By Sharyn\u00a0 L. Decker
\nLewis County Sirens news reporter<\/strong><\/p>\n

OLYMPIA – As expected, Bernard K. Howell III was sentenced yesterday to 26 years and eight months in prison for the murder of 60-year-old Vanda Skau Boone on a bicycle trail in Tenino last August.<\/p>\n

The 27-year-old Tenino man sat quietly between his two attorneys in Thurston County Superior Court as lawyers, the judge and a friend of the victim spoke of the case that was discovered when Howell was pulled over by a deputy and Boone was found dead in his truck, wrapped in a sleeping bag with weights strapped to her body.<\/p>\n

Deputy Prosecutor Jim Powers asked for the maximum sentence.<\/p>\n

\"2010.0810.Vanda<\/a>

Vanda Skau Boone<\/p><\/div>\n

“The state is asking, believes and urges upon the court, that is the only appropriate sentence,” Powers said.<\/p>\n

He called it a particularly gruesome murder, with the victim, timing and place methodically chosen.<\/p>\n

There were multiple blunt force and sharp force injuries, and suffering, Powers said.<\/p>\n

“So the victim not only died at the hands of this defendant, but she also suffered before she died,” he said.<\/p>\n

Howell had been living off and on in Tenino with his father when he was arrested Aug. 8. He pleaded guilty three weeks ago to first-degree murder.<\/p>\n

Defense attorney Robert Jimerson told the judge yesterday his client chose to plead guilty, when no plea agreement was offered and was remorseful.<\/p>\n

“He decided he wanted to plead guilty and he wanted to accept responsibility for what he did,” Jimerson said.<\/p>\n

And while it didn’t excuse what happened Jimerson said, Howell was found to show symptoms of a severe psychotic disorder, the symptoms of which the evaluator said Howell didn’t appear to be fabricating or exaggerating.<\/p>\n

Howell admitted to heavy methamphetamine use in the days before the murder, and the evaluator could not tell the cause of the symptoms, according to Powers.<\/p>\n

Jimerson asked for middle of the standard sentencing range, 280 months.<\/p>\n

Boone, a massage therapist who worked in Olympia and lived in Yelm, was attacked on the bicycle path known as the Yelm to Tenino Trail near Churchill Road Southeast.<\/p>\n

Lori Drayson, who said she and Boone moved from New York to open a healing center, asked Judge Gary Tabor yesterday to lock Howell up for as long as possible.<\/p>\n

“How can I ever forget that phone call … how do I ever erase the image of the horrified look on my friend’s face when the coroner showed me the photo to identify her,” Drayson said.<\/p>\n

She called Howell viscous, and not entitled to walk among the living.<\/p>\n

“How do one feel safe when you have such a creature as Mr. Howell lurking out there,” she said. “It wasn’t even in the dark of night.”<\/p>\n

Howell chose to address the judge. He was polite and brief.<\/p>\n

“God knows how sorry I am,” Howell said. “Christ willing, I’ll have a family someday.”<\/p>\n

He asked the judge to put him in protective custody as he feared what could happen to him in prison.<\/p>\n

Judge Tabor said he recognized Howell has mental health issues and substance abuse issues but they don’t mitigate what he did, he said.<\/p>\n

He had a plan, and it was deliberate, cruel and bizarre, the judge said.<\/p>\n

“The evidence tells us several things, it tells us there was indeed suffering in this case,” Tabor said.<\/p>\n

That it occurred over a substantial period of time makes it particularly egregious, he said.<\/p>\n

Tabor sentenced Howell to 320 months and then three years in community custody after his release. He also ordered substance abuse and mental health treatment.<\/p>\n

Howell’s mother, father and older sister were in the courtroom, although they did not address the judge.<\/p>\n

His mother, Cathy Howell, said she didn’t want people to know what happened. She had little to say afterward.<\/p>\n

“My son is mentally ill and I’m going to be dead when he gets out,” she said.<\/p>\n

His father, Bernard Howell Jr., spoke briefly.<\/p>\n

“We’d like to have something said, we regret what happened,” he said. “It’s very unfortunate things like this are happening.<\/p>\n

“I speak to him almost every day, or every other day, he knows he’s sick. He’s very remorseful.”
\n\u2022\u2022\u2022<\/p>\n

Read most recent story, here<\/a><\/p>\n

Read background, here<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Sharyn\u00a0 L. Decker Lewis County Sirens news reporter OLYMPIA – As expected, Bernard K. Howell III was sentenced yesterday to 26 years and eight months in prison for the murder of 60-year-old Vanda Skau Boone on a bicycle trail in Tenino last August. The 27-year-old Tenino man sat quietly between his two attorneys in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[9,10],"class_list":["post-5831","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-top-story","tag-by-sharyn-l-decker","tag-news-reporter"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5831","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5831"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5831\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5840,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5831\/revisions\/5840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5831"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}