Kyle Dunphey, Utah News Dispatch

Utah man gets prison time for selling 120,000 fake COVID-19 vaccine cards

A Utah man was sentenced to prison on Thursday for selling thousands of fake COVID-19 vaccination cards.

A federal judge sentenced 34-year-old Nicholas Frank Sciotto to 12 months for selling at least 120,000 counterfeit COVID-19 vaccination record cards after he admitted in July to conspiring to defraud the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

According to the U.S. Department of Justice, Sciotto made more than $400,000 in profit.

He was also sentenced to three years supervised release and ordered to pay a $40,000 fine.

Prosecutors say Sciotto lived in Weber County when he started making the cards in March 2021, conspiring with another man, Kyle Blake Burbage. According to a complaint filed in federal court in March 2023, the cards “looked identical to bonafide COVID-19 vaccination record cards which were issued by the CDC at the time.”

“I know someone selling legit vacc (sic) cards cheap for people who don’t want to partake in a science experiment,” Sciotto wrote in a Facebook comment in March 2021.

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Sciotto printed the cards at a local print shop in Utah, the complaint alleges, convincing the store’s owner that he worked for a local hospital and was authorized to “print out thousands of copies of COVID-19 vaccination record cards.”

Sciotto charged $10 for each card, plus shipping, with a discounted price of $7.50 for anyone who ordered 100 or more. He sold “many” of the cards to people living in New York City “to facilitate their evasion of local health and safety protocols,” according to the complaint. Most of the transactions were done via Venmo or Cashapp, and Sciotto advertised the cards on Facebook. Sciotto tried to keep a low profile by changing the shipping addresses and envelopes every week when he made the shipments.

Some of those cards were then resold, with a market value hovering between $50 to $100 per card, according to the complaint.

“Sciotto engaged in this scheme – without regard for any public health consequences or risks that he exposed individuals to during the pandemic, without their knowledge or consent, and he undermined the CDC’s COVID-19 vaccination program and other governmental health and safety regulations and protocols at significant profit,” reads a press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Utah.

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Utah News Dispatch is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Utah News Dispatch maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor McKenzie Romero for questions: info@utahnewsdispatch.com. Follow Utah News Dispatch on Facebook and X.

Utah’s GOP Lt. Gov. warns of threats and Republican claims of fraud as election nears

Utah’s Republican lieutenant governor has strong words for candidates and their supporters who don’t accept election results.

An attack on elections and the people who run them, Deidre Henderson said, is an attack on liberty and free government.

“‘Heads I win, tails you cheated’ is not a foundational principle of a free government,” she told reporters on Thursday.

It’s been a tumultuous election year for Henderson, and elections officials all over the state, who have reported a rise in threats and misinformation. The FBI is currently investigating an envelope containing white powder that was addressed to the Lt. Governor’s Office last month, and Henderson has for months faced accusations that she meddled in the state’s primary election.

FBI intercepts ‘suspicious’ envelope containing white powder addressed to Utah Lt. Gov.

She’s been called “traitorous,” “corrupt” and a closeted Democrat on social media. Her recent decision to not endorse Donald Trump for president, as first reported by The Salt Lake Tribune, has brought a new wave of criticism. Henderson said her office and county officials around the state now have personal protective equipment in case they find suspicious or threatening packages.

Those attacks, Henderson said, are symptoms of a broader distrust in elections and election officials. And as Nov. 5 nears, that rhetoric will intensify, she warned.

Voters will hear claims of rigged elections and corrupt judges; reporters will press candidates on whether they’ll accept the election results; politicians and pundits will argue voting by mail or machine is less accurate; it could take several days, maybe weeks, for some results to be clear; irregularities may arise, not because of a vast conspiracy, but because of human error.

“During the last four years there has been more violence and disruption aimed at our political institutions than we have seen in decades. And while we expect these destructive efforts to continue, we have learned a lot in the past four years and are prepared for it,” Henderson said. “I want to make sure you are prepared too.”

Speaking to a room full of students, reporters, government officials and staff with the University of Utah’s Hinckley Institute of Politics on Thursday, Henderson leveled criticism at her own party for sowing distrust in elections and, in her own words, focusing on the outcome, rather than the process.

“If the outcome is something that they don’t like, they’re going to question everything,” she said.

Henderson described a sentiment that has slowly built among some Republicans, starting in 2016 and reaching a new peak in 2020, where a fringe group of “election vigilantes” are now considered mainstream.

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“Both parties are guilty of this. I do understand that it is much more prevalent among one party right now, in unprecedented ways, so I don’t want you to think I don’t recognize that. I do,” Henderson said, describing a “certain candidate’s” effort to “lay out the case for losing before the election.”

Much of the rhetoric Henderson was referring to can be seen in the Trump wing of the Republican Party. That includes state Rep. Phil Lyman, a Blanding Republican who lost his primary bid for governor and has since tried, unsuccessfully, to argue that Gov. Spencer Cox cheated his way onto the ballot and that Henderson, in her role as lieutenant governor, is hiding evidence. Lyman is now running a write-in campaign for governor.

But despite her criticism, Henderson didn’t mention any candidates or politicians by name. When asked whether she was talking about Lyman, or Utah County Clerk Aaron Davidson, who have both said voting by mail is less safe, Henderson said she was referring to “anyone who makes those claims.”

Just several hours after Thursday’s conference, Lyman took to social media with a message he has often repeated: “The primary election results cannot be verified because Cox and Henderson demand that county clerks withhold basic elections records…Spencer Cox and Deidre Henderson are corrupt, illegitimate candidates.”

Although Utah is home to some moderate, less Trump-aligned candidates — for instance, outgoing Republican Sen. Mitt Romney — Henderson said the narrative around “stolen” elections and voter fraud is just as prevalent here as in other states, with Utah candidates endorsing that narrative. That’s problematic, she told reporters.

“We’ve seen this snowball over the past few years in a way that, like I mentioned, was easy to think it was fringe. And now I see it gaining traction. And that’s what worries me. I worry that we’ve reached the tipping point. I worry that it’s become normal to believe lies, and abnormal to believe truth,” she said.

‘Doubt the doubters’

Henderson’s message to Utah voters was threefold — firstly, “doubt the doubters.” If someone is spreading rumors that “shake your confidence in our elections, stop and ask yourself what their motivation could be.”

Doubt the doubters before you doubt the entire system, Henderson said.

Republicans are losing trust in elections, even in Utah. What should be done?

Candidates and their supporters should also commit, today, to accept the results of the upcoming election. Losing is part of the American process, she said — “Lose with grace, win with dignity.”

“Despite what pundits and politicians on both sides are claiming, no matter who wins in November, this will not be our last election. The next one is just around the corner. This is how we do things in the United States of America,” Henderson said.

And lastly, the lieutenant governor urged voters to take their vote into their own hands.

When ballots are mailed out on Oct. 15, make sure you’re registered to vote, that your address is updated, and that you know who is on your ballot. Vote early if you can, especially if you plan on submitting your ballot via mail. Sign up for updates with your county clerk so you know when your ballot has been received and counted. Contact your clerk with any questions.

Salt Lake County Clerk Lannie Chapman, who was in attendance Thursday, said that prior to 2020, she never would have imagined the state’s top election official talking about mailing personal protective equipment out to her office. Chapman said the county is developing a crisis plan and working with law enforcement in case the threats and intimidation ramp up.

“Since 2020, we’ve seen a lot more people a lot more interested in elections, generally speaking. That includes people that just want to understand the process better, to those who want to disagree with election results and don’t believe in the system,” she said.

Like Henderson, Chapman acknowledged there is a part of the electorate that will never be swayed — both politicians agreed on Thursday that there is nothing they can say to change their minds.

“I’m not going to be everybody’s best friend. I will always speak the truth and I will always follow the law. For some people, it just doesn’t fit with their paradigm and I have realized that,” Chapman said.

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Utah Highway Patrol warns of bizarre scam involving broken down vehicles and fake gold

Next time you see someone stranded on the side of the road with a broken down car, keep your guard up if you pull over to help. If they try to sell any jewelry or merchandise, it’s a good sign you might be getting scammed.

That’s according to the Utah Highway Patrol, which issued a warning this week to Utah motorists about a growing scam in the Beehive State — people posing as stranded motorists, only to attempt to sell “fake gold” for money to anyone that stops.

So far, most reports have occurred in Salt Lake County.

The Utah Department of Public Safety said in some cases, the scammers are using “illegal tinted covers” to hide their license plates. The department has received multiple reports, a spokesperson said on Friday, but no arrests have been made.

“They are attempting to take advantage of the kindness that we value in our community,” the Utah Department of Public Safety said in a social media post.

The department said if you encounter a similar situation, or experience a breakdown on a freeway, contact your local dispatch center or dial 911.

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Judge blocks Utah’s social media laws — writing they likely violate the First Amendment

Utah’s social media laws that sought to curb teen use and protect their online privacy were put on hold Tuesday after a federal judge ruled they were likely unconstitutional, violating the First Amendment.

In a 39-page ruling, U.S. District Court Judge Robert Shelby in Utah granted a request for a preliminary injunction, blocking the law from taking effect on Oct. 1 while the lawsuit plays out.

Lawmakers passed SB194, which created the Utah Minor Protection Social Media Act during the 2024 legislative session, which would have required social media companies verify the ages of all users to place default restrictions on accounts belonging to minors.

Those restrictions included limiting direct messages, visibility and sharing features to the user’s “friends,” while disabling features that lead to “excessive use” like autoplay, push notifications and “perpetual scrolling.”

It would have also allowed parents or guardians to engage with their children’s accounts, granting them the ability to override the default settings imposed by the state. And, companies would be blocked from collecting and selling data tied to minor accounts.

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Lawmakers hoped the new restrictions would give parents a tool to curb their children’s online presence, citing studies and stories that showed a link between social media use and depression, even suicide.

The trade association NetChoice, which represents companies like Google, Meta and X, claimed the restrictions violate the First and 14th amendments. Those same allegations were made in a similar lawsuit from several Utah-based activists and social media users, who also said the laws violate the Commerce Clause.

Shelby, in his ruling, acknowledged the state’s “earnest desire to protect young people from the novel challenges associated with social media use.”

“But owing to the First Amendment’s paramount place in our democratic system, even well-intentioned legislation that regulates speech based on content must satisfy a tremendously high level of constitutional scrutiny,” the ruling reads.

Shelby wrote that Utah has yet to show the state’s social media laws can withstand that scrutiny. As to the question of whether the laws violate social media companies’ First Amendment rights, Shelby said “the probable answer is ‘yes.’”

Utah changed its social media laws to avoid constitutional issues, but legal challenges persist

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox on Wednesday said he was “disappointed” with the ruling, but wrote on X that the state would continue its efforts to change how minors interact with social media.

“We always knew that this could be a long battle. And it is a battle worth waging, as the harm social media is causing our children continues. Let’s be clear: social media companies could voluntarily, at this very moment, do everything that the law put in place to protect our children. But they refuse to do so. Instead, they continue to prioritize their profits over our children’s wellbeing,” Cox said.

Chris Marchese, director of the NetChoice Litigation Center, said the ruling highlighted the “flawed” nature of the law, arguing that it was not only unconstitutional, but could also “backfire and endanger the very people it’s meant to help.”

“We look forward to seeing this law, and others like it, permanently struck down and online speech and privacy fully protected across the country,” he said in a statement. “With this now sixth injunction against these overreaching laws, we hope policymakers will focus on meaningful and constitutional solutions for the digital age.”

The recent laws were the legislature’s second attempt at passing laws dealing with minors and social media, after the state was sued over two bills passed during the 2023 legislative session — the next year, lawmakers revised the laws in hopes that they passed constitutional scrutiny, but the legal challenges remained.

SB194 was passed along with a companion bill, HB464, which would allow an individual or organization to sue companies for any alleged harm done to a minor from social media use.

According to the bill text, a licensed mental health care provider would have to diagnose an “adverse mental health outcome”; a social media company would then have to prove to the court that their algorithmically curated content wasn’t the root cause.

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Did the Iranian group that hacked Trump’s campaign also target Utah?

The Iranian-affiliated group that successfully hacked former President Donald Trump’s campaign “possibly” targeted infrastructure in Utah, although the state’s Department of Public Safety can’t say for sure.

Last week, several national security and law enforcement agencies confirmed Trump’s claim that Iranian hackers had successfully compromised his campaign. Now, Utah officials said the group, called Mint Sandstorm, could be behind unsuccessful hacking attempts related to Utah’s oil and gas industry and other geological data.

The division analyzed data from March 2023 to March 2024, although that’s not necessarily when the attempts took place. The investigation didn’t find any evidence of a breach.

“Indicators of compromise were researched and possibly tied to the threat actor group Mint Sandstorm, but it is not confirmed that it was this group. So, we cannot confirm the attempts we observed were Mint Sandstorm,” the Utah Department of Public Safety, or DPS, said in a statement to Utah News Dispatch on Monday.

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Mint Sandstorm has been active since 2013, targeting Iranian dissidents, journalists, universities and government agencies, according to a report from Microsoft’s Security Insider. According to Meta, the group targeted the campaigns of both Trump and President Joe Biden earlier this year using WhatsApp. Documents hacked from the Trump campaign were later sent to The New York Times, Washington Post and Politico.

In a story published last Friday, NBC News reported the same group attempted to breach “Utah-based assets including a county in Utah, geological archive data, oil and gas, and other geographical resources related to Utah,” citing a leaked DPS document issued on July 30. A spokesperson for the Utah Geological Survey told the news outlet the agency was unaware of any attempted attack.

But DPS on Monday told Utah News Dispatch that the report was partly “inaccurate.”

“Our leaked For Official Use Only report indicated that it could possibly be a threat from the actor group Mint Sandstorm, but we never confirmed the source,” the department said.

Whether the attempted incursion came from Mint Sandstorm or not, it’s fairly common for foreign nations, or groups associated with them, to target state institutions or businesses. Each week, there are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of hacking attempts and probes linked to other countries, said Jeff Plank, a sergeant with the Utah State Bureau of Investigations who supervises its cybercrime unit.

Mostly they stem from China, Russia and Iran, he said, often interested in critical infrastructure. The state’s water and energy infrastructure and financial system are frequent targets. So are the mining, oil and gas industries.

“They’re always looking to see how they can possibly use that data to harm our critical infrastructure. Oil and gas is definitely one of the big ones,” said Plank, who couldn’t speak specifically to the Mint Sandstorm report.

And while one million attempts in a single week may seem like a lot, Plank said foreign governments or government-affiliated groups write programs allowing them to launch repeated, automated attacks.

“Those numbers add up pretty quickly. And it’s a way to probe, reach and look into things and see if they can get from one network to the next,” Plank said. “The idea is a well-balanced attack and they’re going to go after every single infrastructure that they can.”

Those “probes” are often exploratory, but they can yield big results with potentially dangerous or damaging consequences, especially when they target critical infrastructure.

“All of a sudden you might find that you’re able to turn off a valve, or turn up the temperature,” said Plank.

Hackers also routinely target Utah networks in hopes of gaining access to federal data. In 2013 when the National Security Agency built its data center in Bluffdale, Plank said the state saw an increase in what he called “interest from various nation states.”

“Utah in general saw a lot more interest and visits by foreign IPs when that was happening, and still today. Some people think there’s a backdoor here, where they can go through the state network and get to the NSA,” he said.

Plank reminded Utahns on Monday to take a few simple, minimal steps to protect themselves from cybercrime:

Make sure your computer’s operating system is up to date.

Create new and complex passwords.

Use two-factor authentication.

Back up your sensitive data offline.

Be skeptical of emails from strangers that could be phishing attempts.

If you have employees, have them undergo cybersecurity training.

“That should save most people a lot of headaches,” Plank said.

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How a law passed earlier this year made executions in Utah a more secretive process

There are still unanswered questions in the wake of the execution of Taberon Honie earlier this month, Utah’s first capital punishment in over a decade and first lethal injection since 1999.

Where did Utah buy the lethal injection drug, pentobarbital? And who administered it? What were the credentials of the execution team?

Those details will likely remain unclear, even for Honie’s attorneys, after a new law passed last legislative session increased the secrecy surrounding executions in Utah, part of a nationwide trend to conceal the source of lethal injection drugs and the identity of those who administer them.

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Passed with unanimous approval from both the Utah House and Senate and signed by Utah Gov. Spencer Cox on Feb. 16, SB109 is nearly 1,000 lines long and imposed various tweaks to how the Department of Corrections operates. It increased coordination between county jails and prisons, directed the Utah Department of Health and Human Services to provide health care to inmates, created a reentry division to help inmates after their release, and allowed corrections staff in some instances to use their state vehicle while off-duty.

A late amendment, the bill also prevents the release of certain records related to executions, including any “identifying information” of the people who take part in the process — that includes the medical team, corrections workers, contractors, consultants, executioners administering the drugs, and other staff or volunteers.

For instance, the two corrections officers who escorted journalists to the death chamber before Honie’s execution weren’t wearing name tags.

Utah executes Taberon Honie by lethal injection, first capital punishment since 2010

The law also blocks the release of any identifying information of the person who manufactures, supplies, compounds or prescribes drugs, medical supplies and equipment used in an execution.

Not only does the law bar the public’s access, it prevents the records from being used as evidence during court proceedings and being released during discovery, the process where all relevant documents are made available during a lawsuit.

Honie was executed shortly after midnight on Aug. 8. It took about 17 minutes from when the drugs were administered to when his heart stopped, and in that time, Honie did not appear to suffer.

But in the weeks leading up to the execution, Honie’s attorneys said there were several red flags that they were unable to investigate because of the new law. That includes verifying where the drugs came from and the credentials of who administered them.

“The Department of Corrections’ overboard reliance on the secrecy statute to withhold all relevant information about execution drugs and personnel prevents prisoners and the public from verifying that executions are carried out in compliance with the written procedures, state law and the Constitution,” said Honie’s attorney, Eric Zuckerman, in a statement to Utah News Dispatch.

The Utah State Correctional Facility is pictured from a “free speech zone” set up about two miles from the facility in Salt Lake City on Wednesday, Aug. 7, 2024 as the state prepared to execute death row inmate Taberon Honie just after midnight. (Photo by Spenser Heaps for Utah News Dispatch)

The legislation mirrors policies passed in other death penalty states — from January 2011 to August 2018, 17 states conducted 246 lethal injection executions, according to a report from the Death Penalty Information Center, a national nonprofit organization that provides data and analysis on issues concerning capital punishment. Every state except Delaware, which abolished the death penalty in 2016, has passed laws to hide information related to the drugs and who administers them.

For instance, Texas, which conducted 89 executions during that time frame, has a law concealing the identity of anyone who “uses, supplies, or administers a substance during the execution” and “any person or entity that manufactures, transports, tests, procures, compounds, prescribes, dispenses, or provides a substance or supplies used in an execution.”

At least two states, Arkansas and Virginia, have exceptions that allow some of that information to be released during litigation. Utah’s law has no such carveout.

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The bill was sponsored by Utah Sen. Derrin Owens, R-Fountain Green, one of several lawmakers who witnessed Honie’s execution. In a statement to the Dispatch, Owens said the bill established a “firewall that maintains a clear separation between public entities and suppliers.”

“This bill enhances privacy for businesses and helps the state procure critical supplies. SB109 will improve the effectiveness and fairness of the criminal justice system while addressing logistical challenges,” Owens said.

Without some guarantee of anonymity, officials with the Department of Corrections said it would be almost impossible to obtain the drugs or hire contractors to carry out executions.

Last October, the Utah Attorney General’s Office contacted the Department of Corrections, letting them know that Honie was nearing the end of his appeals, said Brian Redd, executive director of the Utah Department of Corrections. That’s when the department started looking for lethal injection drugs — but pharmacies and medical personnel are often reluctant to participate in executions.

Sometimes the reluctance is based on ideology or religion. Other times it’s a fear of public backlash.

Pharmaceutical giant Pfizer sells drugs like potassium chloride or fentanyl under the condition they will not be used in a lethal injection; the European Union outlawed selling drugs to be used in executions; the American Medical Association’s Code of Medical Ethics states physicians “must not participate in a legally authorized execution.”

“We weren’t having any luck getting anyone to cooperate with us,” said Redd. “The law that was passed just enabled us to give some confidence to the medical professionals that assisted us in being able to communicate. That allowed us to do our job.”

Death row inmate Taberon Honie leaves for break during the Utah Board of Pardons commutation hearing Tuesday, July 23, 2024, at the Utah State Correctional Facility, in Salt Lake City. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer, Pool)

But the law was the subject of controversy leading up to Honie’s execution and Zuckerman, his attorney, accused the process of being “shrouded in secrecy” in a letter to the governor.

In the letter, Zuckerman described an “extreme level of secrecy.” That includes the “secret, anonymous source” who sold the state pentobarbital for $200,000, which Zuckerman said “was more than twice what any other state has paid”; the department refusing “to provide any original documentation verifying the source’s licensing and other relevant legal compliance”; and the inability to verify the storage conditions of the pentobarbital, “raising serious concerns about whether the drug has already been tainted.”

“Transparency is the hallmark of a free society, yet this process has been anything but transparent,” Zuckerman wrote to Cox, asking the governor to pause the execution, a request that was ultimately denied.

Redd pushed back on that criticism in an interview last week.

“We’re trying to be a very transparent organization. Our administration has made that decision, and I think our record over the past year and a half probably speaks to that. But this is one area where in order to fulfill our statutory duty, it just had to be put in place,” he said, telling Utah News Dispatch the department vetted the medical professionals and the chemicals used in the execution to make sure everything was up to date. The pentobarbital came with a certificate of authentication, he said.

Prior to the bill, the Department of Corrections would have still tried to keep certain information related to executions private. If someone requested the identity of the police officers who participated in the firing squad execution of Ronnie Lee Gardner in 2010, for example, the department would have argued those were protected records. But there’s still a chance that information could have been released in court proceedings — now, SB109 makes it clear what can and can’t be released.

Honie, 48, was pronounced dead at about 12:25 a.m. on Aug. 8 after being injected with two doses of pentobarbital. He was sentenced to death in 1999 for the violent murder of his ex-girlfriend’s mother, Claudia Benn, after breaking into her home and sexually assaulting her.

Utah News Dispatch was among the media witnesses for the execution.

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A death row inmate’s plea: ‘Would you allow me to exist?’

In his own words, Taberon Honie “exists” in prison.

The death row inmate, who is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection on Aug. 8 for the gruesome rape and murder of his ex-girlfriend’s mother, compared himself to fertilizer, “helping things grow.” He’s changed over two decades of incarceration, he argued, earning his diploma and the trust of prison staff, while supporting his daughter as she struggled with addiction.

On Monday, he imparted what could be one of his final pleas: “Would you allow me to exist?”

“I’ve shown you that I can exist in prison. I’m not a threat to the public, I’m not a threat to anyone,” Honie told the Utah Board of Pardons and Parole during the first day of his commutation hearing.

Once the two-day hearing is over, the board will decide whether Honie’s execution will continue as planned, or if he will instead serve the remainder of his life in prison with no chance of parole.

Honie was convicted and sentenced to death in 1999 for sexually assaulting then murdering Claudia Benn, the mother of his ex-girlfriend. According to court documents, Honie took a cab at about 11:20 p.m. to Benn’s home, where he proceeded to argue with her through a glass door. While her three grandchildren were inside, Honie used a rock to break the door and enter the home.

He then sexually assaulted Benn before cutting her throat and mutilating her body, according to court documents. Two of the three children had blood on them and court testimony would later reveal Honie admitted to molesting one of them.

Honie has unsuccessfully appealed the sentence in the years since the conviction and earlier this summer the Utah Department of Corrections received an execution warrant.

A remorseful sounding Honie told the board on Monday that he’s not proud of the things that he did and wishes he could take them back.

“Claudia didn’t need that stuff done to her. She’s never hurt me in any way to do that to her,” Honie said, telling the board that he’s a changed man.

“Could I take that back? I wish I could. Am I proud of it? No. Am I making excuses? No,” Honie said, a sentiment he would repeat several times over the 45 minutes he spent making his statement and fielding questions from the board.

“The individual who committed those crimes ain’t the individual that is talking to you today. For the last 20 years I’ve been going by culpability, accountability, responsibility. But no matter how much change I make, I can’t make that right to their family,” he said.

Despite Honie’s emphasis on accountability and aversion to making excuses, he also told the board several times that he was in a drug-induced haze the day he murdered Benn, which he believes led him to commit the crimes that would later lead to his death sentence.

“I’m not trying to minimize anything. I’m not trying to take away from Claudia’s family’s pain,” he said. “I would feel the same way they do. I’ve read the declarations. Yes, I’m a monster. Yes, I’m a P.O.S. The only thing that kept me going all these years is the only thing I know 100%, is this would have never happened if I was in my right mind. That’s the only thing that I know 100%.”

Honie’s memory from the day he killed Benn is foggy. He told the board that he started drinking and doing drugs at 8 a.m. and important details — like how he broke into Benn’s home, why they were arguing in the first place, specifics about how she fought back — are lost to him. He said he was likely planning to sleep under Benn’s porch, like he had before, and that he was aware the children were in the home.

“But I truly don’t remember a lot of it,” he said.

Key to Honie’s plea was his daughter, who is in recovery and has battled addiction. He helps her the best he can, Honie told the board.

“How can I come over here and ask you guys to spare me? Because I’m her helper, I’m her guiding light, I’m her pillar,” Honie said, while acknowledging he took that same “guiding light” away from Benn’s family when he murdered her.

“I’m the one that took that,” he said. “I killed Claudia Benn.”

‘What life?’

The hearing on Monday also included testimony from Matthew Sakiestewa Gilbert, a professor and head of the University of Arizona’s Department of American Indian Studies; Victoria Reynolds, a clinical psychologist who specializes in psychological trauma; and Honie’s mother and daughter.

Together, the testimony painted a picture of Honie defined by childhood trauma and addiction. Sakiestewa Gilbert said both of Honie’s parents attended Indian boarding schools, leaving them with lasting trauma.

Reynolds said Honie watched his mother attempt suicide at a young age; at 12 years old he began drinking and smoking marijuana habitually, later turning to inhalents, cocaine, hallucinogenics and eventually “whatever substance was available”; and at 18 years old, he suffered a traumatic brain injury while running from police, one of many brain injuries during his life that would leave him unconscious or seeing stars.

Honie’s daughter said she now struggles with addiction, telling the board “my father is there for me however he can be.”

And his mother, Teresita Honie, read a prepared statement asking the board to spare her son’s life. Her family has already been through turmoil, she said, with one of her children having died of cancer and another recently diagnosed.

“I’m told that you all would like to take his life away. To this I say, what life? Twenty-six years ago, my son’s life was taken. Since then, he exists in a facility, being told when to eat, when to sleep, when to get up and when he can go out to get some sun. This is not life, but existence,” she said.

“Is it not enough suffering that I have to endure yet for my son to be taken, as he has already been taken 26 years ago?” she said, concluding her statement.

Department of Corrections gets new drug for lethal injection

Honie sued officials with the Utah Department of Corrections earlier this month over the cocktail the state had planned to use in his execution. But over the weekend, the state said it had obtained a dose of pentobarbital, which has been used in federal executions and is authorized in at least 10 states.

That marks a change in the state’s original plan to use ketamine, fentanyl and potassium chloride, an unproven and never before used cocktail. Honie’s attorney argued the drugs would cause unnecessary pain and suffering, while triggering hallucinations, paranoia and “mental anguish.”

Now that the department secured pentobarbital — which Honie’s attorney previously argued is the preferred method for execution — attorneys for the state say the lawsuit should be dismissed.

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Utah's GOP governor objects to Project 2025's call for repeal of the Antiquities Act

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox has his issues with how the federal government manages its public lands in the state. But he thinks the Antiquities Act, which allows the president to designate national monuments without congressional approval, should remain.

That’s at odds with the conservative Project 2025 initiative, which calls for the repeal of the act, established in 1906 and used to safeguard some of America’s most iconic public lands.

“I don’t support a complete repeal,” Cox said Friday during the monthly PBS Utah press conference with the governor. “I think the Antiquities Act has value. The problem is the Antiquities Act has not been used the way it was intended to be used.”

Published by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, Project 2025 is a manifesto describing the various policies that a new Republican administration could enact. It touches on issues like immigration, defense, regulations, the environment and the economy.

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Referring to Grand Staircase-Escalante, the manifesto decries “the designation of a vast national monument in Utah over the objections of Utah leaders — but with the support of the Hollywood elite.” It accuses the U.S. Department of Interior of abusing the Antiquities Act and recommends the second Trump administration, if elected, take “a fresh look at past monument decrees.”

Cox, while not advocating for a repeal, echoed some of the sentiments in Project 2025, telling reporters he takes issue with “large scale, million-acre deployments” — that includes national monuments like Bears Ears or Grand Staircase-Escalante.

“That’s just not what this was supposed to do,” he said.

Grand Staircase-Escalante was designated by President Clinton and Bears Ears was designated by President Obama. Both monuments were drastically reduced in size by President Trump, then reinstated by President Biden.

Utah promptly sued the federal government over Biden’s reversal. That case was dismissed in August 2023 by a U.S. District Judge and within days the state filed an appeal with the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals. Cox on Friday reiterated his belief that the case would end up before the U.S. Supreme Court.

“I feel very confident that the Supreme Court will look at this and say presidents have not followed the Antiquities Act the way it was intended to be followed,” Cox told reporters.

But Steve Bloch, legal director for the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, said the governor’s interpretation of the act doesn’t mesh with the last century of precedent.

Bloch pointed to national parks like the Grand Canyon, Grand Teton and four of Utah’s Big Five — Arches, Capitol Reef, Zion and Bryce Canyon national parks — which all started as national monuments, designated by a president who used the Antiquities Act. Since 1906, the act has been used over 300 times to set aside millions of acres of land, according to the National Park Service.

“Even without arguing explicitly for a repeal, his version of what the act would authorize a president to do is simply inconsistent with how the act has been used and how the act has been upheld by courts for more than 100 years,” Bloch said. “It’s simply rewriting history to say that Congress didn’t intend to authorize the president to protect large landscapes.”

Repealing the Antiquities Act would require an act of Congress and regardless of political affiliation, public lands, including national monuments in Utah, have broad support among voters in the West.

According to Colorado College’s annual Conservation in the West poll, 83% of respondents said they supported Biden’s “30×30” initiative, which includes a push to designate new national monuments and conserve more land.

About 84% of respondents said they support creating new national parks, monuments and wildlife refuges, and designating new tribal protected areas of historic significance.

Meanwhile, a 2023 poll from Deseret News found that 42% of Utah voters support keeping Bears Ears at its current size, compared to 26% who are opposed.

“The American public supports these types of designations — Utah is a great example. Four of our five national parks started off as monuments. Nobody thinks that was a bad idea,” said Bloch.

Currently two states — Wyoming and Alaska — have exemptions carved out in the Antiquities Act that requires Congress to approve any national monument designations. Cox would like to see something like that in Utah, which he called “the pincushion for Democrats.”

“Whenever they need an environmental win, they just approve another monument in Utah and I don’t think that was ever intended,” Cox said.

Although Project 2025 spells out an ambitious conservative policy agenda, Trump has recently tried to distance himself from it. Earlier this month, he took to Truth Social, claiming he knows “nothing about Project 2025.”

“I have no idea who is behind it. I disagree with some of the things they’re saying and some of the things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal. Anything they do, I wish them luck, but I have nothing to do with them,” Trump wrote.

Rep. Ken Ivory, R-West Jordan, is listed as one of Project 2025’s contributors. And Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee is quoted on the 922-page initiative’s jacket, calling it a “blueprint” to “dismantle the administrative state and return power back to the states and the American people.”

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'Horrific death': Utah could be first state to use ketamine in execution

On Aug. 8, Utah could become the first state in the country to use ketamine, a powerful anesthetic, in an execution by lethal injection.

But Taberon Honie, the state’s first death row inmate to face an execution warrant in more than a decade, is suing officials with the Utah Department of Corrections, claiming the novel approach could lead to unnecessary pain and suffering, while triggering hallucinations, paranoia and “mental anguish.”

The 75-page complaint, filed in Utah’s 3rd District Court in Salt Lake City, argues the effects of the drug cocktail — ketamine, fentanyl and potassium chloride — will violate Honie’s constitutional rights.

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Eric Zuckerman, Honie’s attorney, also writes the state’s current execution protocol is rushed, outdated and inadequate, with text messages obtained through a subpoena suggesting a lack of communication between Utah Department of Corrections staff and the Attorney General’s Office.

Filed on Thursday, the suit names Brian Redd, executive director of the Utah Department of Corrections; Bart Mortensen, warden of the Utah State Correctional Facility; Randall Honey, director of prison operations, and the various “unnamed and anonymous” employees and staff “preparing for or carrying out Honie’s execution.”

The suit asks the court to put the scheduled execution on pause until the Department of Corrections takes the “reasonable and necessary steps to devise a new procedure.” Zuckerman is also asking the court to allow Honie’s counsel to have access to a communication device during the execution.

Without one, Honie could be deprived of his ability “to contact a judge during his execution should it appear the execution is being carried out in a way that violates” the state constitution.

Glen Mills, director of communications for the Utah Department of Corrections, said the agency “anticipated this move, and will be watching to see how it plays out.”

“In the meantime, we are moving forward with our plan to fulfill our statutory responsibility on the date assigned,” Mills said in an email.

Honie was convicted in 1999 for sexually assaulting then murdering 49-year-old Claudia Benn, the mother of his ex-girlfriend. According to court documents, Benn’s three grandchildren were inside the home at the time.

A hearing is set for Wednesday before 3rd District Court Judge Linda Jones. The Utah Board of Pardons and Parole has also scheduled a commutation hearing for Honie starting on July 22, where he can argue his case for spending the rest of his life in prison rather than being executed.

Claims of ‘psychological torture’ and ‘unnecessary mental anguish’

Ketamine is a dissociative anesthetic that can lead to hallucinations, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. The drug is “notorious for creating a psychotic state,” the complaint reads, which can result in paranoia, anxiety, strong hallucinations and out-of-body experiences.

If administered intravenously, Honie could be exposed “to unnecessary mental anguish” and rendered “incompetent,” Zuckerman writes. The lawsuit also claims the drug can cause suffocation, nausea and vomiting. There’s a greater risk of choking, according to court documents, because Honie will be strapped to a gurney “and unable to adequately lift his head.”

And the more ketamine that’s administered, the worse the “problematic” side effects become, the lawsuit alleges — it has what’s called a “ceiling effect,” meaning higher doses don’t necessarily correlate to more effective pain reduction.

Meanwhile, the powerful synthetic opioid fentanyl has only been used in one U.S. execution, a 2018 lethal injection in Nevada where it was one of four drugs. Even in high doses, the complaint claims, fentanyl can’t “reliably induce unconsciousness.” And it could lead to “wooden chest syndrome,” according to court documents, causing “Honie to feel as if his chest has turned to stone, rendering him unable to breathe.”

Potassium chloride, the last drug to be administered, has for years been used in lethal injections around the country. But if the prisoner is not adequately unconscious, which Honie’s attorneys warn could happen, potassium chloride leads to “excruciating suffering.”

The drug is used to stop the inmate’s heart by disrupting the sodium and potassium ions in the cardiovascular system, which quickly causes an irregular heartbeat, then cardiac arrest, according to the National Center for Biotechnology Information.

But without being properly sedated, potassium chloride can lead to extreme pain, described by the Center for Death Penalty Information as “liquid fire.”

In short, ketamine could cause “psychological torture,” fentanyl could lead to painful suffocation, and neither drug will mask the pain brought on by potassium chloride, Zuckerman writes. As a result, Honie could “suffer a horrific death.”

That’s an “unconstitutional” risk of pain and suffering, the lawsuit alleges. In addition, the Department of Corrections failed to take “necessary safeguards” in its execution protocol, which increases the risk of harm, Zuckerman writes. That includes failing to train staff and drafting “life-saving contingency plans.”

The complaint argues that instead of the current cocktail, a single-drug lethal injection using pentobarbital would “significantly reduce the substantial risk of severe pain.”

Pentobarbital is currently authorized in Texas, Arizona, Idaho, Missouri, Kentucky, Georgia, Louisiana, Ohio, North Carolina and South Dakota. Twelve of the country’s 24 executions carried out in 2023 were done with pentobarbital, according to records submitted as exhibits in the lawsuit.

Lawsuit: Department of Corrections’ protocol was ‘rushed’

The lawsuit also paints the protocol developed by the Department of Corrections as rushed, outdated and inadequate, a claim the department disputes.

Pointing to text messages submitted as an exhibit, Honie’s attorney says the department was “caught off guard” when the Utah Attorney General’s Office submitted the execution warrant.

After the warrant was submitted, Mills, the director of communications, wrote in a text to the department’s executive team: “They filed it last night. Nice to get notified!!!”

In response, executive director Redd texted “Oh wow. Unreal.”

Mills said on Friday the department knew well in advance the warrant was coming and had been planning the protocol for about a year, challenging the lawsuit’s claim that they weren’t aware the warrant would be filed. But they weren’t notified by the Attorney General’s Office, he said, instead finding out from Honie’s counsel.

“We weren’t caught off guard by the warrant being issued, we felt we should have been notified by the Attorney General’s office,” Mills told Utah News Dispatch on Friday.

The complaint also accuses the department of providing inconsistent information and making “misleading and false statements to the courts” regarding the dosage of the drugs and how and when they’ll be administered.

According to the complaint, that led to an inadequate protocol regarding things like the IV lines, instructions on how to administer backup syringes, possible secondary doses, logistics with the new prison site and how the consciousness check (prison staff will try to ensure Honie is unconscious before the potassium chloride is administered) will be conducted.

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Mass shooters 'do not just snap': How to spot violent people — according to the FBI

Mass shooters don’t just snap — whether it’s changes to their behavior or personality, comments or jokes about self harm and violence, or obsessing over past mass shootings and perpetrators, they leave behind a trail of warning signs that can sometimes span years.

That’s according to Shohini Sinha, the special agent in charge of the Salt Lake City FBI Field Office, who briefed reporters Monday on the agency’s new Prevent Mass Violence campaign, which outlines the behavior often exhibited by people who carry out mass shootings and other violent incidents on a large scale.

The number of mass casualty events — defined by the National Institutes of Health as a disaster, either man-made or natural, that overwhelms local management agencies and the health care system — are on the rise, said Sinha.

In intentional, human-caused incidents, Sinha said the perpetrator often displays noticeable red flags.

“Active shooters, mass shooters, do not just snap. They consider, they plan and they prepare for their attacks over time, sometimes as long as years. Often, people around them see what’s happening,” she said.

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Making comments and jokes about self harm, suicide, violent thoughts, plans or fantasies are among the red flags, she said — so are changes in vocabulary or personality in a way that “reflects a hardened point of view or new sense of purpose associated with violent extremist causes.”

“Unusual” difficulty dealing with stress, viewing violence as a solution to problems, isolation from friends and family, and obsessing over prior attacks or attackers are also on the FBI’s list of concerning behavior.

“If you notice somebody doing any of these things, it’s important that you talk to somebody you trust,” Sinha said. “What is important is that you tell somebody, because we can’t do anything about it if we don’t know.”

There isn’t behavior that’s particularly unique to Utah or the Mountain West to be aware of, she told reporters. Asked about incidents that happened locally, Sinha pointed to an active shooting in May 2023, where Salt Lake City police responded to 17th South River Park.

According to a probable cause affidavit filed in Utah’s 3rd District Court, Steven Matthew Macias admitted to drinking alcohol at the park, then shooting and injuring one of the men he was with.

According to court documents, Macias then began shooting into a crowd watching a soccer game, admitting “he was aware of the people around him and he had no regard for anything.” He struck one bystander in the chest, critically injuring them.

During his interview with officers, Macias “admitted he shot and killed his neighbor in Texas in January 2023 because his neighbor had upset him,” according to the affidavit.

According to court filings, Macias was charged with 25 felonies, though most were dismissed after he struck a plea deal. In June, he was sentenced to five years to life in the Utah State Prison for two counts of felony discharge of a firearm. He is also facing charges in Texas related to the death of his neighbor.

Another incident in 2021 is more of a success story — after receiving a tip from the FBI, the Weber County Sheriff ‘s Office arrested a 15-year-old Weber High School student who had planned to make explosives and shoot people in what she called “a Columbine-style mass casualty event,” according to the Standard-Examiner.

“I need guns. And I need bullets. And I need alcohol. And I need bombs. … And I need to kill all of these f—-,” the girl wrote in her diary, according to the Standard-Examiner. She also described her plans via text, telling someone the shooting would be her way to “make my mark on society.”

Rhetoric like that is almost exactly what’s spelled out in the FBI’s public awareness campaign — referring to prior attacks like Columbine, creating a plan, and viewing violence as a means to an end.

That behavior is a throughline in most cases of mass violence anywhere in the world, said Sinha, who worked in the FBI’s counterterrorism division and served in places like Guantanamo Bay and Baghdad.

“The indicators aren’t particular to one specific motivation or ideology. So you could take that list that I read off and overlay it to somebody who is motivated by international terrorism, or domestic terrorism, or just plain old violence,” she said.

The FBI gets thousands of tips concerning potential mass shooters. Some are credible, but many are not, and Sinha described the process as a “science and an art.”

Investigators first look at all available information. If it meets the U.S. Attorney General’s guidelines, the FBI will begin an investigation, often looking at open sourced information like social media, to determine whether the person is “a little misguided and saying things that are not proven, or are they actually making a threat,” Sinha said.

If you believe someone is planning violence, contact local law enforcement or your local FBI field office, or report it at tips.fbi.gov.

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'Inappropriate': State employees accuse Utah Republican of verbally abusive conduct

Republican gubernatorial candidate and outgoing state Rep. Phil Lyman was accused of being misogynistic, verbally abusive and using expletives during a meeting with state employees earlier this year, according to an investigative report obtained Friday by Utah News Dispatch.

The investigation, conducted by the law firm Parsons, Behle & Latimer, found that Lyman’s conduct was “unprofessional and inappropriate,” and satisfied “several of the hostile-work-environment elements.”

“However, it is also my conclusion that Rep. Lyman’s conduct was not sufficiently severe in its nature to create an abusive working environment,” the investigator wrote in the report, concluding that Lyman did not violate any of the Utah Legislature’s policies or federal, state or local laws or state policies.

The investigation stemmed from a Jan. 25 meeting between Lyman and the Utah Trust Lands Administration, known colloquially as SITLA, an independent state agency that manages state trust lands to raise funds for Utah public schools. During the meeting, investigators say talks got tense as Lyman and SITLA employees discussed the Bears Ears land swap, a now failed proposal to exchange land between the state and federal government. In the weeks following the meeting, Utah backed out of the exchange over concerns about how the federal government planned to manage Bears Ears National Monument.

According to the report, Lyman called female SITLA employees “idiots,” used expletives and mimicked them “in a way that both women considered to be a gendered verbal attack.” Once Lyman began using expletives including the f-word, the SITLA employees walked out of the meeting, the report states.

On Friday, Lyman, a Blanding Republican and the lone remaining GOP challenger to Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, defended his conduct in the meeting. In an initial, more tempered statement, he told Utah News Dispatch that environmental groups are colluding with federal and state agencies, which impacts his district.

In a later statement, he added: “Yes, I said it and I will say it again. They’re taking all of the f—— land.”

According to the investigation, the meeting was originally scheduled to discuss HB320, a bill Lyman sponsored but never passed. It would have prohibited state employees or contractors from getting a financial bonus “for overseeing the sale of trust lands” while giving the Legislature more power over SITLA.

According to the report, Lyman accused SITLA staff of “making up” the fiscal note attached to the bill. A finance officer then suggested Lyman and SITLA meet in person in his office, per the investigation. The names of the SITLA employees are redacted in the investigation.

Investigation Report (SITLA)

During the meeting, “it quickly became clear to (the SITLA employees) that Rep. Lyman was not actually interested in talking about the financial numbers in the fiscal note,” the report states.

“Rep. Lyman said he ‘didn’t care about the numbers.’ He just wanted to make SITLA do things it was ‘supposed to be doing anyway,’” the investigation notes. “He claimed that (redacted) and the people at SITLA were either ‘idiots,’ or they had been ‘duped by the Red Rock Wilderness conspiracy.’ He said (redacted) and her colleagues ‘don’t know what [they’re] doing.’ He said SITLA is a ‘failed agency’ and that if he had his way, he would dissolve SITLA except for the fact that he did not trust the Utah State Legislature to take over.”

The investigation notes that a SITLA employee tried to “redirect the conversation,” but “Rep. Lyman just got more and more aggravated.”

That’s when one of the female SITLA employees told Lyman, “We’re going to have to agree to disagree,” the report states.

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According to the investigative report, Lyman “parroted back” what the SITLA employee said, “In a high-pitched voice while gesturing with his hands and tilting his head in a manner that made it clear to both (female employees) that Rep. Lyman was mocking based on her gender.”

One of the employees later told an investigator she considered the representative’s conduct to be “misogynistic.”

Lyman then continued discussing the Bears Ears Land Swap, which is when he began to use explicit language, according to the report, telling SITLA employees: “You’re trading out the f—— lands” or “You’re trading out of f—— land in Bears Ears.”

The SITLA employees began to leave Lyman’s office, and one of them told the representative “his conduct was unprofessional.”

Lyman asked how, to which the employee responded, “You just yelled the F-word at us,” according to the report. Lyman denied doing so, the investigation states. The SITLA employees “said they had all heard it. Rep. Lyman then said he was not saying it at them; he was merely talking about the land,” according to the report.

As they were trying to leave the office, Lyman “went back to accusing SITLA of taking kickbacks and receiving commissions on land sales.”

A SITLA employee disputed the accusation, telling him “she was certain that was not happening.” Again, Lyman “mimicked what (the female employee) had just said, using a high-pitched voice and gesturing with his hands.”

The two employees then left Lyman’s office. “As they exited, Rep. Lyman said, ‘I’m not done with you yet,’” the investigator reported.

In an attempt to “memorialize” their recollection of the meeting and out of fear that Lyman would harm SITLA’s reputation, the employees wrote a bullet list of the events, according to the report.

A copy of the bullet points obtained by Utah News Dispatch detail exactly what is noted in the investigation, including a claim that Lyman spent about “10 minutes being verbally abusive, accusing us of being incompetent and not doing our jobs, saying we are either stupid or being duped into the Red Rock Wilderness conspiracy, telling us SITLA is a failed agency and that he would dissolve it if he trusted the legislature more.”

Both female employees told investigators that they were hesitant to attend another private meeting with Lyman. One said she would not meet with him “unless there were men with her” — the other said she would decline any invitation unless it was in conjunction with a public hearing.

However, both employees said they never felt physically threatened by Lyman, according to the investigation.

As part of the investigation, the investigator wrote that he interviewed three people who were present at the Jan. 25 meeting, but he did not interview Lyman. Lyman told Schultz he didn’t want to be interviewed, which is why Schultz instructed the investigator to draft the report without speaking to him, according to House staff.

After interviewing the three other people present in the meeting and “in response to a question from Speaker Mike Schultz, I opined that it was unlikely that anything Rep. Phil Lyman might say in an interview would alter my answers to the questions identified above,” the investigator wrote. “Accordingly, Speaker Schultz instructed me to draft my report without speaking with Rep. Lyman.”

House Speaker Mike Schultz, R-Hooper, was advised by attorneys to hire external counsel to conduct the investigation. In a Friday statement to Utah News Dispatch, Schultz acknowledged Lyman’s behavior was “unprofessional” but the investigation concluded he did not break any laws.

“Earlier this year, a complaint was brought to our attention against one of our House members. We followed all processes and procedures to address the concern in a timely, professional, and fair matter including hiring outside counsel to conduct a thorough and impartial investigation,” Schultz said in the statement.

A request for comment from SITLA officials was not immediately returned Friday evening.

Contributing: Katie McKellar

Clarification: This story has been updated to include more information about why House Speaker Mike Schultz told the investigator to draft his report without speaking with Rep. Phil Lyman. Lyman told Schultz he didn’t want to be interviewed, according to House staff.

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