COEUR D’ALENE, Idaho (AP) – Edgar Steele, who once represented Aryan Nations founder Richard Butler in a lawsuit that bankrupted the white supremacist group, has died in federal prison in California. Steele was 69.
Steele was serving a 50-year sentence at the federal prison in Victorville, California, after he was convicted of plotting to kill his wife.
The prison website listed him as dying on Thursday. No other details were immediately available, and the prison operator phone went unanswered Friday.
Steele was convicted of four felonies in 2011 after authorities said he tried to have his wife and her mother killed by a handyman he hired to plant a car bomb.
Steele wanted his wife dead so he could collect on an uninsured motorist insurance policy and be free to pursue a relationship with a woman from Ukraine, prosecutors said. He paid $10,000 in silver to another Idaho man who agreed to kill the women, authorities said.