Authorities are searching for a white supremacist Idaho prison inmate and an accomplice who fled after the accomplice shot and wounded corrections officers as they were transporting the inmate from a Boise hospital, the Associated Press reports. Police said Nicholas Umphenour is suspected of shooting two corrections officers during Wednesday's ambush in the ambulance bay at Saint Alphonsus Regional Medical Center. A warrant was issued for his arrest on two charges of aggravated battery against law enforcement and one charge of aiding and abetting an escape. He and inmate Skylar Meade drove off early Wednesday after the shooting in a gray 2020 Honda Civic with Idaho plates. Three corrections officers were shot and wounded during the attack — two allegedly by Umphenour and one by responding police.
Officials described Meade, 31, as a white supremacist gang member. He was sentenced to 20 years in 2017 for shooting at a sheriff’s sergeant during a high-speed chase. The new attack occurred as Idaho Department of Correction officers prepared to bring Meade back to prison. Department Director Josh Tewalt said Meade was taken to the hospital at 9:35 p.m. Tuesday after he engaged in “self-injurious behavior” and medical staff determined he needed emergency care. One officer shot by the suspect was in critical but stable condition, while the second wounded officer had serious but non-life-threatening injuries. “This brazen, violent, and apparently coordinated attack on Idaho Department of Corrections personnel, to facilitate an escape of a dangerous inmate, was carried out right in front of the Emergency Department, where people come for medical help, often in the direst circumstances,” said Boise Police Chief Ron Winegar.