‘She was scared to death’: Friends testify in murder trial

COEUR d’ALENE — People close to the late Kendy Howard told jurors Tuesday that she was scared of her husband but looking forward to a new life without him in the days before her death.

Daniel C. Howard, 57, is accused of battering and killing his wife at their Athol home in February 2021. The former state trooper has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder and felony domestic battery. Tuesday marked the second day of what is expected to be a three-week trial.

Prosecutors said Daniel Howard killed Kendy Howard by using a “carotid restraint technique” that cut off her blood flow, then placed her body in the bathtub, shot her in the mouth and staged the scene to look like she died by suicide.

Daniel Pardo, of Kamiah, took the stand Tuesday. He was in a romantic relationship with Kendy Howard before her death.

The pair met in middle school and dated in high school. Pardo said they maintained a friendship as adults and rekindled their romance in 2020, falling deeply in love with each other, though Kendy Howard was married.

“She was looking at getting a divorce,” he said in court. “She wanted to move back to our hometown, Kamiah. She wanted to purchase a home. She wanted to possibly start an antique store.”

Pardo said he and Kendy Howard hid their relationship from her husband, who worked in Alaska for three weeks at a time. He said she was stressed about the idea of leaving her 27-year marriage to Daniel Howard.

“She was pretty terrified about how he was going to react when she told him,” Pardo said.

In the early hours of Jan. 29, 2021, Pardo said he got a phone call from Kendy Howard. She didn’t speak directly to him, he said; rather, she spoke to her husband, whose voice Pardo heard in the background.

“She was very distraught, emotional,” Pardo said.

He said he heard Kendy Howard say she was trying to go to the bathroom, along with thuds, like she was struggling to close a door. He heard Daniel Howard ask who she was talking to on the phone.

Pardo said he hung up and called Kendy Howard’s parents, who in turn called 911.

Hours later, he said Kendy Howard called him again, distraught and sobbing. She told him she woke that morning to see her husband standing over her, wearing dark clothes and gloves. She said she saw a magazine from a gun on the floor.

“She said, ‘When he looked at me, he was looking right through me,’” Pardo said. “She felt Mr. Howard was going to kill her.”

Michelle Lampert, Kendy Howard’s close friend, also received a call early Jan. 29. Kendy Howard told her the same story about waking up to her husband looming over her.

“She was scared to death,” Lampert said. “She was afraid he was going to kill her.”

Lampert said her friend disliked guns and wasn’t suicidal. In the days before Kendy Howard’s death, they discussed future plans, including the hot tub she’d just bought for her new house in Kamiah.

“She was going back home,” Lampert said. “Yes, she might’ve been scared to divorce, but she was happy to start her life over and she was excited to get out of Kootenai (County). She was looking at a brighter side.”

Lampert described seeing bruises on Kendy Howard’s body during a July 2020 camping trip. She said she disliked Daniel Howard because he was arrogant and controlling when it came to money.

Prosecutors said Daniel Howard killed his wife to avoid splitting $2 million in shared assets in a divorce.

Lampert’s husband, Dean Lampert, also testified Tuesday. He told jurors Daniel Howard sometimes bragged to him at social gatherings.

“He said ‘I can make a murder look like a suicide,’” Dean Lampert said.

After Kendy Howard’s parents called 911, two sheriff’s deputies responded to the Howard home for a welfare check.

Dep. Jonathan Traw testified Tuesday that Kendy Howard seemed anxious and scared when he spoke to her, though she also seemed relieved when police arrived. The husband and wife told police they were discussing divorce but denied any arguments or physical altercations.

While deputies were at the home, Kendy Howard packed a bag and went to stay with her parents in Kamiah. Pardo joined her at her parents’ home, where he said she repeated that she had seen a magazine from a semiautomatic pistol on the floor the night before.

The next day, she returned to Athol.

“I told her not to go and she felt she had to,” Pardo said. “She had an eye appointment she had to be at. She had work. She had animals to take care of. She said to me, ‘I’m scared to go back, but he knows now he got caught. He’s not dumb enough to try anything like that again.’”

Pardo said Kendy Howard described her husband as more accepting of the split than he had been before, which made Pardo feel uneasy.

“It didn’t feel right,” he said.

Pardo never saw her alive again, though they spoke on the phone the night she died, Feb. 2.

“She was happy things were moving forward and continuing with the house,” he said. “She was excited.”