BOISE -- A man who abducted, raped and murdered a Boise State student on the Greenbelt in 2000 has died in prison, the Idaho Department of Corrections confirmed Thursday.
Darrell Edward Payne was scheduled to be executed for the murder of 22-year-old Samantha Maher. He died at the Idaho Maximum Security Institution Thursday morning after a long illness.
The Ada County Coroner's Office said Payne died at 6 a.m. of natural causes. He was 49 years old.
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Maher was kidnapped while walking to class along the Greenbelt July 6, 2000. Payne sexually assaulted her, shot her in the head, and dumped her body in a concrete drainage tank.
Payne was convicted in 2002 and sentenced to die, but a judge overturned his conviction, saying victim impact statements given by Maher's friends and family were "excessive (and) inappropriate," and unfairly prejudiced the jury.
An Ada County jury handed down a death sentence again during Payne's resentencing in 2010. IDOC spokesman Jeff Ray said a date had not yet been set for Payne's execution.
