A man recently convicted a third time in the murder of two people in north-central Idaho more than 3 decades ago has again been sentenced to life in prison.
Nez Perce County 2nd District Court Judge Jay Gaskill Friday sentenced Mark Lankford to two fixed life sentences in prison.
A Canyon County jury last month reached a guilty verdict for Lankford, who along with his brother, were originally found guilty for the 1983 beating deaths of a couple camping in the backcountry of Idaho County.
Bryan Lankford is serving a life sentence for the killings.
Mark Lankford, who has been behind bars since the crime, won an appeal on his first conviction, and was retried and convicted a second time. However, he won a second appeal when the Idaho Supreme Court overturned his 2008 conviction after it was learned prosecutors failed to inform defense attorneys the full details of a deal made with an incarcerated witness in exchange for testifying against Lankford.
The latest trial took 10 days and saw seven women and five men deliberate for about three hours before returning guilty verdicts on two counts of murder for the now-63-year-old Lankford. The case was tried in Caldwell in order to avoid bias. (Lewiston Tribune)
