By Michael Donoghue, Vermont News First

A former Lamoille County man may soon be facing the federal death penalty for a 2023 double homicide — and the woman involved in a fatal shootout with the U.S. Border Patrol in Orleans County last month also could be facing the same fate.

New U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, among her recent directives, ordered the offices of U.S. Attorneys across the nation to revive the use of federal death penalty charges. She also wants the moratorium on federal executions lifted, according to a Feb. 5 directive obtained by Vermont News First.

A new indictment filed against Theodore “Theo” Bland, 29, of Burlington late Thursday afternoon in Vermont adds two felony charges against him and opens the door for the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington, D.C. to review his case as a possible death penalty case.

Bondi’s new directives appears to open the door in Vermont for Teresa Youngblut, 21, to be considered for the death penalty the double homicide last month. A federal grand jury in Burlington has indicted Youngblut on two serious aggravated assault charges related to the shooting death of Maland, a veteran Border Patrol Agent and K-handler.

The U.S. Department of Justice recently restored an old directive that former President Joe Biden had rolled back so his U.S. Attorneys could avoid filing the most serious charges in criminal cases.

President Donald J. Trump has said he wants federal prosecutors in the 94 districts nationwide to use all the stiffest criminal charges on the books.

It would be up to federal prosecutors in Vermont to get the final green light from the Justice Department to seek the death sentence for any case. A couple of Vermont cases were reviewed in recent years, including the execution of a husband in Hinesburg, but the Justice Department did not approve the death sentence.

Michael P. Drescher, the acting U.S. Attorney for Vermont, declined Thursday evening to discuss the new Bland indictment nor would he speculate on more charges in the Youngblut shooting case.

Drescher told Vermont News First his office would likely have a news release on Friday about the new Bland indictment.

St. Johnsbury lawyer David J. Sleigh, who represents Bland in federal court, was dismayed by the latest legal maneuver.

“I’m dismayed by the fealty to the imprudent and reckless directive of the new Attorney General. I had higher expectations from our U.S. Attorney’s Office and from the men and women there who appeared to have a commitment to justice,” Sleigh said in an email to Vermont News First.

The two new charges against Bland note that while he was involved in drug trafficking crimes on Oct. 12, 2023, he caused the deaths of Jahim “Debo” Solomon and Eric “E” Wright by using a firearm.

The new counts in the indictment said each “killing was a murder as defined” by federal law, and there was “malice aforethought.”

The bodies of Solomon, 21, of Pittsfield, Mass. and Wright, 21, of Chicopee, Mass. were found in Lamoille County more than a week after they were shot in a trailer in Lowell, court records show.

Solomon and Wright were both known as drug dealers and their families have said they came to Vermont to expand their business, court records show.

Federal law says if a person while committing a crime of violence or drug trafficking is involved in a murder, they may “be punished by death or by imprisonment for any term of years or for life…”

The last person sentenced to death in Vermont was Donald Fell for a deadly carjacking case in Rutland almost 25 years ago. The federal court conviction was overturned in 2014 due to misconduct by a juror who admitted he had driven past the crime scene while the trial was underway in Burlington.

Fell was due for a second death penalty trial when he reached a plea agreement in September 2018 and was sentenced to life in prison without parole. He admitted killing two people, including Rutland supermarket worker Terry King, 53, of North Clarendon in November 2000.

Fell, who was 20 years-old during the crime spree, also admitted to killing Charles Conway while his friend, Robert Lee killed Fell’s mother in her Rutland home.

The two killers then carjacked and kidnapped King as she arrived at work and drove her to New York, where they killed her. Lee committed suicide in prison rather than facing a jury trial.

Fell would have been the first person executed in a Vermont case in more than 60 years. The Burlington jury voted on the death penalty.

APPLYING THE DIRECTIVE

Bondi, in her 4-page directive, noted the Justice Department during its 155-year history has sought the death sentence for the very worst criminals. She said the department had failed in recent years to seek death sentences against mass murderers, terrorists, child rapists and other dangerous defendants. She added President Biden, in his final days in office, commuted the sentences of 37 death row inmates.

Besides the Maland case in Vermont, Bondi also cited in her memo the homicide case of Debrina Kawam who officials say was burned to death when an illegal immigrant from Guatemalan set her on fire as she slept on a New York City subway on Dec. 22.

Nobody has been charged with the actual shooting death of the Border Patrol Agent in Vermont, but newly filed papers in a related federal court case indicate Youngblut was the only person to file shots at Maland after he ordered a car to stop on Interstate 91 in Coventry about 3 p.m. Jan. 20.

Maland was shot in the throat and was rushed by police cruiser to North Country Hospital in Newport where he died about 4 p.m.

A still unidentified Border Patrol Agent is credited with returning fire and wounding Youngblut and killing her companion, Felix Bauckholt, 28, a German national before he could get a shot off, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives reported.

The ATF said the two suspects had been provided their guns by Michelle J. Zajko, 32, formerly of Derby, who has been charged with illegally buying them from a licensed gun dealer in Mount Tabor, south of Rutland. She bought at least four guns illegally in Vermont, the ATF said. She is in custody in Maryland, where she was arrested on Sunday on unrelated charges.

Bland, who most recently lived in Burlington, grew up in Lamoille County, mostly in Stowe. He is being held without bail.

Vermont News First citing its own investigation, interviews and court records reported last year that Bland had helped plan and carry out the double homicide.

Bland also recruited help to dispose of the bodies in Eden near the Lowell town line, records show.

The new indictment against Bland still includes Dilan Jiron, 29, of Hyde Park as a co-defendant. Jiron is charged for offering assistance and comfort to Bland in order to prevent his apprehension, trial and punishment, the indictment said.

Also still listed in the indictment is the third co-defendant, Justin “J.D.” Douglass, 38, of Hardwick, who is charged with conspiring with Bland and others between Sept. 7, 2023 and Oct. 15, 2023 to distribute crack cocaine (cocaine base.)

The double shooting on Oct. 12, 2023 happened at a mobile home at 497 Eden Road in Lowell, although some witnesses said the trailer was in the town of Albany, officials said. It was the residence of Donald “D.J.” Billow, police said.

Investigators reported Billow noted it was his grandmother’s residence, but Douglass was going to rent a room. Billow also knew two “plugs” — street talk for drug dealers or suppliers — were staying at the trailer, police said. They were believed to be White and Solomon, who were initially staying at an Airbnb in Stowe.

On the day of the shooting Billow said he only got into the kitchen when he saw Bland “going crazy and running around with a firearm. Billow advised he observed ‘Theo’ shooting the gun down the hallway at the door to the bedroom,” court records note.

Billow said he did not see anybody get shot and he decided to flee the trailer, court records show.

A few days later, Billow said Bland asked him for help cleaning the Lowell residence. Billow reported he helped pull out the carpet and burned it along with a mattress and a bureau in the yard, police said.

Billow maintained he never saw any bodies and did not help anybody move bodies, police said.

Solomon and White had taken an Uber from downtown Burlington near City Hall Park to the Northeast Kingdom with Bland, their suspected killer, and with his then-girlfriend, Teesha Nooth, 30, about 1:30 a.m. Oct. 12, 2023 — one day before the killings, according to court records. The foursome was caught on video getting into the Uber in Burlington, police said.

The foursome was dropped off about 3:12 a.m. near Hazen Road and Larabee Hill Road in Albany.

After the fatal shootings, as police began to focus on suspects, an associate of Bland told Vermont State Police that the bodies could be found in remote areas near a pull off on the Albany-Eden Road in the town of Eden, records show.

Vermont Game Warden Dustin Snyder and his K-9, Fletch, found the body of Solomon on the evening of Oct. 24, records show. As police combed the area the next day, Morristown Police Detective Lt. Todd Baxter located the body of White nearly a mile farther into the woods, police have said.

Solomon died from multiple gunshot wounds to the head, according to the medical examiner. White died from a single gunshot wound to the head, the doctor said. Both were ruled homicides.

The bodies were wrapped in clear plastic, similar to a large roll of plastic what was found at the Billow residence in Lowell by the Vermont Crime Scene Search Team, records show.

Both bodies were covered with tarps. Solomon was tied with a ratchet strap, while White was secured with an extension cord, jumper cables and a chain, police said.

Bland was first reported as the person of interest in the double homicide in a Vermont News First story that appeared in multiple newspapers in Vermont and Massachusetts in December 2023.

The following month the U.S. Attorney’s Office used the Vermont News First newspaper story in an effort to ask a federal judge to have Bland detained in an unrelated gun and drug case from earlier in South Burlington. The judge agreed.

Prosecutors declined at the time to elaborate on why Bland was a person of interest.

Federal prosecutors worked with state and local police to develop more evidence in the following months and obtain a new indictment.