Driver stopped near Boise has ties to missing Illinois man

A traffic stop southeast of Boise on Sunday morning turned out to be anything but routine.

Law enforcement officials recovered a vehicle, wallet, credit cards and cellphone of a 62-year-old Illinois man who has been missing since late August, according to court documents. They also found a sheet in the car that appears to have blood on it.

The man driving the vehicle — a minivan — is a Texas fugitive who is wanted on warrants for alleged theft and attempted arson.

Jeffrey Mason Maynard, a 25-year-old from the Houston suburb of Cypress, was charged with felony grand theft, grand theft by possession of stolen property, attempted aggravated assault on officer, providing false information, reckless driving and possession of a controlled substance (marijuana).

He was arraigned Monday and his preliminary hearing is scheduled for 8:30 a.m. Sept. 25. He’s being held at the Ada County Jail on $500,000 bond.

Here’s what happened at about 9 a.m. Sunday, according to the criminal complaint against Maynard, the probable cause hearing and information from the Ada County Sheriff’s Office:

A sheriff’s deputy saw a blue Plymouth van on westbound Interstate 84 east of Eisenman Road that was driving about 60 mph and switching lanes to keep a semi truck from passing. The deputy pulled over the minivan.

The driver, later identified as Maynard, had trouble finding his wallet, was shaking profusely and made what an investigator thought was paranoid-sounding statements about someone being out to get him. He tossed a can of mace that he had in his lap onto the floor of the van after the deputy asked him to get out.

Maynard provided a false name, investigators said.

The van that he was driving belongs to John Henry Cumby Jr., a man who hasn’t been seen since he left for a camping trip to Colorado on Aug. 20. Cumby is from Rock Falls, Ill.

At the hearing, a prosectuor said there are Nevada plates on Cumby’s vehicle — and a database search shows he has previously lived in Nevada.

Maynard had more than one explanation for how he came into possession of Cumby’s van and other personal property, including that they had been together in Idaho Falls. He also said he was going on a shopping trip.

Cumby’s cellphone was recovered from the van’s glove box. Investigators found some recent Google searches on the cellphone, done in Washington state, that had to do with the use of Asperger’s syndrome in criminal defense. Maynard told deputies that he had symptoms of Asperger’s.

This story was originally published September 15, 2017 at 7:21 AM with the headline "Driver stopped near Boise has ties to missing Illinois man."