Ex-Idaho police officer jailed in Bend in parents’ deaths

A former Idaho police officer, arrested early Friday by Deschutes County sheriff’s deputies on car theft and other charges, is being held for Idaho authorities in connection with his parents’ deaths.

William Paul “Willie” Taylor, 48, of Nampa, Idaho, is being held at the county jail in Bend on $1 million bail on a Canyon County, Idaho felony warrant for failing to report the deaths of Paul Robert Taylor, 76, and Mary Jane Taylor, 77.

Nampa police said they responded around 8 p.m. to a home in the 1900 block of West Flamingo on a report of an unattended death.

They found the couple’s bodies at the home and “the nature of the deaths was suspicious,” according to a Nampa Police Department news release, which said the case was being investigated as a homicide.

Taylor was arrested early Friday morning at an undisclosed location in Deschutes County and arraigned later in the day on a DA’s initial charging document, listing four counts: possession of a stolen vehicle, unauthorized use of a vehicle, identity theft and tampering with physical evidence.

Deschutes County sheriff’s deputies said they could not divulge further details about the arrest, due to an ongoing investigation.

Taylor is due back in a Bend courtroom on Sept. 22 for arraignment on formal charges, online documents said.

Nampa police said evidence from Taylor’s arrest and at the residence has led them to believe the victims are hi s parents, but an autopsy is scheduled early next week in hopes of confirming their identities.

Taylor’s last known address was at his parents’ home in Nampa, police said. Taylor was a Nampa police reserve officer from June 1990 to October 1991, when he left to take a job with the Pocatello Police Department, where he remained until December of 1996.