On what would have been his son James’ 24th birthday, Currie owner Glenn Taylor offered a $1000.00 for information leading to the arrest and conviction of James Taylor killer Glen Mead.
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Two weeks ago Mead’s killing of 23 year old James Taylor was ruled a justifiable homicide in an Elko County Coroner’s inquest a finding the elder Taylor vigorously disputes.
“It was an absolute miscarriage of justice from the moment deputies arrived,” Taylor said. “ With my son laying dead with five bullet holes in him, they didn’t even charge him (Mead with murder) with murder that night. The Sheriff’s office and the DA’s office did virtually no investigation in the three weeks between James’ killing and the inquest and the evidence and the testimony given in the inquest was a joke. There was no study done on the angle of the bullets. I could go on and on. They even ignored Mead’s own statements that he didn’t feel threatened and that he should not have shot James a third time.”
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While Taylor’s efforts could be written off as those of an aggrieved parent flaying against the proper verdict of the inquest new evidence at least suggests, Mead may have had murder on his mind the night he killed James Taylor.
In an exclusive interview with the High Desert Advocate, Perette and Everett Rhodes of Cherry Creek said they were present at a barbecue two week before the killing when Mead threatened the lives of James and Glenn Taylor.
“Glenn was coming in from Salt Lake,” said Perette Rhodes. “ And Mead said that if he didn’t get money from Glenn, bullets would be flying. I said something like you got to be kidding and he said no, three hots and a cot were better than nothing.”
The coroner’s panel never heard from the Rhodes.
“We didn’t contact the police or the DA because who ever heard of a man shooting another man five times walking free?,” said Perette Rhodes
“I don’t blame the panel,” Taylor added. “After the instructions of the judge there was hardly a way for them not to get the verdict they delivered on the other hand I have know doubt in my mind that had this case been charged and investigated properly Mead would have been found guilty in a criminal trial. What the Rhodes said to me was completely voluntary and came out of the blue, who knows what a real police investigation might turn up.?”
To encourage others to come forward with what they know of the killing Taylor is offering a $1000.00 reward.
“If the state won’t do it I will,” He said. “My son deserves justice. I hope once the public hears the facts it will bring pressure on the district Attorney’s office to reopen the case and charge Mead with murder as they should have done but didn’t when the killing happened.”
According to Sheriff’s detective Cpl. James Carpenter, deputies were dispatched at 10:30 p.m. September 4 to a trailer owned by Mead, 59, of Ely on a report of a domestic disturbance.
When they arrived deputies found a 24-year-old James Taylor, lying dead on the on the ground near the camper. He had been shot five times.
Mead was booked that Monday morning into the Elko County Jail on an unrelated misdemeanor warrant out of Ely Justice Court. His bail was $1,830.
According to Elko Sheriff Jim Pitts the incident began with a fight at a Labor Day barbecue and escalated.
A coroner’s inquest is a rarely used tool in Elko County and reserved almost exclusively for death’s where the cause is not immediately apparent.
The Rhodes statements should they be listened to by District Attorney Marc Torvinen may put the case in a whole new light. Instead of being a cowering old man in a trailer as he portrayed himself to the coroner’s panel Mead by his alleged statements to the Rhodes could be portrayed as a conniving scoundrel who just 14 days before the killing vowed to kill and expressed hatred toward his employer, Glenn Taylor.
“The police, the prosecutor and the judge all had their mind made up from the beginning,” the elder Taylor said Wednesday. “My son was killed September 5th. The investigation if you can call it that lasted a week. And three weeks later Mead walks out a free man. Tell me is that justice?”
“Of course we are ready to testify as to what Mead said,” Everett Rhodes. “There is no way this guy should get away with murder. I warned James to stay away from Mead. I took his threat very seriously.”
Thats cold. The local goverment is the individuals personal image of the Federal Goverment. So maybe the state should take over the case if possible, because White Pine County is making the rest of us Goverment Employees look bad.
editor’s note it is Elko County not White Pine County