Page 19 - Flathead Beacon // 3.5.14

FLATHEADBEACON.COM COVER MARCH 5, 2014 | 19

In Montana and across the country, the

death penalty is on life support as debate

and legal challenges raise the question of

whether lethal injection is constitutional

BY TRISTAN SCOTT

B

utch Hurlbert and his daughter, Jenni- tence of life imprisonment without the possibility of

fer, want the man who destroyed their parole, thus avoiding a lengthy trial, subsequent hear-
lives to die.
ings required of any death penalty case and a lurry of
They don’t care how or by what appeals.
means — Butch wishes he’d done it him- The Hurlbert family understands the bureaucratic
self when he had the chance — but they
nuances of a capital case, the yards of red tape and the
believe the only channel to quell their anger, the only rationale behind the prosecution’s decision. But more
way to soothe their sufering, is for Tyler Michael Mill- than three years after the shooting, they anguish daily
er to breathe his last breath, the ultimate penance for over the reality of their loss, and knowing that Miller

the cruelty he dealt the family.
still lives, even behind bars, they view the injustice in
monochrome, the passage of time having done little to They almost got their wish. But in Montana, which
drive away their pain and anger.
hasn’t executed an inmate since 2006 when David
Thomas Dawson was killed by lethal injection — the
“I want an eye for an eye,” Butch said. “There’s not
fourth inmate to die at the hands of the state in its his-
a shadow of a doubt that he killed my daughter and
tory — the death penalty is never a sure thing, and ex-
granddaughter. I raised them both. Constitutional
ecutions have been suspended statewide pending the rights? Where were their rights?”
Death pena
lty

outcome of a legal challenge, while the country has ex-
O
perienced a gradual trend away from capital punish- N CHRISTMAS DAY 2010, BUTCH and Jenni-
ment.
fer sat waiting in a truck outside Jaimi’s apart-
Soon after Miller’s arrest in 2010, prosecutors ment, expecting the girls to arrive home any minute to
elected to charge him with a capital crime for the set up the teenager’s gift — a new bed. The family had
Christmas Day double homicide of Jaimi Hurlbert, 35, just come from opening presents at Butch’s Kalispell
and Alyssa Burkett, Jaimi’s 15-year-old daughter, in home, where ribbon and wrapping paper still littered
part because Montana law says the state must make a the living room loor.

death penalty decision within 60 days of iling charg- Before heading to the apartment, Jaimi and Bur-
es. It was the irst capital case in Flathead County kett had gone to the home of Miller’s mother to pick up
since the 1983 deliberate homicide conviction of Ron- 17-month-old Hailey, the daughter she and Miller had
ald Allen Smith, who remains on death row 32 years together during their brief and turbulent relationship,
after murdering two Blackfeet men in East Glacier, his which was characterized by physical and psychologi-
fate now squarely at the center of a lawsuit challeng- cal abuse, as well as drug use.
ing the constitutionality of Montana’s lethal injection Miller was not allowed at his family home due to

protocol.
his constant methamphetamine use, but that day he
Miller ultimately pleaded guilty to the crime, and convinced his mother, Cindy Regnier, to let him come
Flathead County prosecutors, facing an expensive, over, promising there would be no confrontations be-
time consuming and uncertain path in their pursuit tween Hurlbert and himself, that he wanted to be with
of the death penalty, struck a deal that ensured a sen-
his family on Christmas.