James Edward Wood

James Edward Wood (born James Godwin; December 9, 1947 – February 1, 2004) was an American murderer, serial rapist and self-confessed serial killer. A violent sex offender with an extensive criminal record, Wood was convicted and sentenced to death for the June 1993 murder of 11-year-old Jeralee Underwood in Pocatello, Idaho; following his arrest, he was investigated for several murders committed while living in Louisiana, none of which were definitively linked to him. He died at the Idaho Maximum Security Institution in 2004. in Pensacola, Florida. His childhood was apparently normal until 1955, when the 8-year-old witnessed the tragic death of his mother, who perished in a fire while saving two other workers at a potato warehouse in Rupert.

Shortly after the tragedy, he was adopted by his aunt and uncle in Idaho Falls, who changed his name to James Edward Wood. Wood drove her to the nearby forest, where he raped and shot her in the head; miraculously, Masengill survived. Due to the severity of the crime, a total of 12 charges were brought against him, including first-degree murder, kidnapping and the two rapes. Her skeletal remains were found in a rural area west of Shreveport on January 7, 1981. In his confession, Wood claimed that he had driven her to the General Electric Industrial Plant, where he raped her in the back seat of her gold and beige Oldsmobile, before driving Coleman out in the woods and shooting her in the back of the head. Following his confession, authorities also started investigating him in relation to the 1979 disappearances of 18-year-old Dodie Gay and Arrilla Vaul, both of whom vanished within months of each other in Shreveport. While there were initial suspicions that these were simple boastful confessions akin to Henry Lee Lucas, investigators considered them credible enough to look into Wood further. In the end, however, he was never charged with any of these cases due to lack of physical evidence linking him to the crimes.

Trial and sentence During his September trial, Wood plead guilty to the Underwood murder, much to the displeasure of his lawyer. Subsequently, he was found guilty and sentenced to death. A few weeks after the sentence, he filed papers to waive all future appeals and speed up the execution process, but was later convinced by his new lawyers to reconsider. In the appeal that followed, attorneys Rolf Kehne and John Adams argued that their client's sentence should be overturned due to ineffective counsel. This stemmed from the claim that the previous lawyer, Monte Whittier, had convinced Wood, a Mormon in the same congregation as him, that he could be forgiven through blood atonement. Justice Lynn Winmill denied the request, as in his view, while Whittier's conduct was indeed flawed, it was not severe enough to affect Wood's decision.

Death For the remainder of his life, Wood was housed on death row at the Idaho Maximum Security Institution in Kuna. He died from suspected natural causes on February 1, 2004, after complaining about breathing problems earlier in the day.