Ed Loder’s son said the long investigation and prosecution delayed the family’s ability to mourn and remember him outside court.
POLSON, Mont. — For more than a year and a half after Ed Loder was killed, his family’s attention remained fixed on searches, evidence and court hearings. A 50-year sentence for James Phillip Lawrence has now closed the criminal case and allowed relatives to begin grieving on different terms.
Greg Loder told a crowded Lake County courtroom that his father had spent his life quietly helping people and making their lives easier. He called him the center of the family and a beloved presence in the valley. About 600 people attended the 67-year-old man’s celebration of life, Greg Loder said, reflecting a community impact that extended well beyond his immediate relatives.
Lake County District Judge Molly Owen sentenced Lawrence on June 12 for deliberately killing Loder and attempting to conceal the crime. She imposed 50 years for deliberate homicide and a concurrent 10-year term for tampering with evidence. Lawrence received credit for 644 days already served. The sentence reached the maximum set by his plea agreement.
Afterward, Greg Loder said no sentence, regardless of its length, could return his father. Still, he said the family was satisfied with the result and relieved to close one stage of the case. He thanked the investigators and community members who helped search for Loder, recover his body and support the family through the prosecution. Greg Loder said the legal process had not felt like a normal period of mourning. The family had been required to revisit the disappearance, the killing and the disposal of the body as investigators developed the case and lawyers prepared for court. With sentencing complete, he said relatives could focus on remembering his father, repeating his stories and teaching his values to their children.
The case that consumed those months began when Loder was reported missing from his Timberlane Road home on Sept. 4, 2024. Lake County Undersheriff Ben Woods responded, and authorities soon discovered blood near the property. They also found Loder’s bloody eyeglasses in a ditch and at least five 9 mm cartridge casings.
Search-and-rescue members moved through the region on foot and horseback, while drone operators surveyed difficult areas from the air. Searchers did not find Loder during the first day. His disappearance increasingly appeared to involve violence, and deputies began examining electronic records and footage that could reveal who had traveled near the property.
Investigators used information from Loder’s cellphone along with recordings obtained from private homes and local businesses. The material pointed toward the Arlee area and captured a red Chevrolet pickup at locations relevant to the developing timeline. Deputies traced the truck to Lawrence, obtained a search warrant for his Polson residence and took him into custody.
During questioning, Lawrence waived his Miranda rights and admitted killing Loder, court records said. “I’m toast anyways I guess, so, yeah I did it,” he told investigators. He said the body was in the Jocko area and accompanied detectives to the place where he had left it. Loder was recovered at about 1:30 p.m. Sept. 6, 2024, in the Twin Lakes-Jocko Canyon area outside St. Ignatius. Lake County Sheriff Don Bell later credited Lawrence’s cooperation with helping authorities find the remains. Lawrence said he had used a 9 mm firearm and could not recall how many times he fired, according to the court records.
As detectives worked to understand the motive, they found a will in Loder’s home. It concerned the estate of Mary Mendenhall and named Loder as the beneficiary of 80 acres next to his property. Court documents said the estate was worth millions. Lawrence and his wife, Debra Lawrence, were each left $5,000.
Lawrence believed the couple should have received more. He told investigators that Mendenhall had previously implied or promised a larger inheritance. He accused Loder of approaching her near the end of her life with an attorney and persuading her to sign a will that favored him. Investigators learned, however, that the property arrangement involving Loder had existed for two or three years.
The available court reporting does not show that Loder was found to have tricked Mendenhall or improperly obtained the inheritance. Lawrence’s accusation was reported as part of his statement to detectives, not as an established finding. Prosecutors instead treated his resentment over the estate as evidence of a financial motive.
Lawrence first pleaded not guilty to deliberate homicide and tampering with or fabricating physical evidence. He was held in the Lake County Jail without bond while the case proceeded. He later accepted a plea agreement and admitted guilt, leaving the sentencing court to decide how severely he should be punished within the agreement’s limits. Intent became the central issue during the hearing. County Attorney James Lapotka said Lawrence had remained angry about the will for approximately four years. The prosecutor argued that Lawrence went to Loder’s home, hunted him down, killed him and carried the body to the canyon area to hide the crime.
Defense attorney Benjamin Darrow said Lawrence’s visit had begun as an effort to discuss the inheritance. He maintained that Lawrence did not plan a killing but fired after the conversation became heated. Lawrence apologized to the Loder family, saying he was sorry and hated that the shooting had happened.
Owen found evidence of planning rather than a purely impulsive act. Sheriff’s Deputy Brandon Gale presented surveillance footage and phone records that traced Lawrence’s movements and his red truck. The judge regarded that reconstruction as convincing and imposed the full 50-year sentence permitted by the plea agreement.
The sentence resolved the dispute over Lawrence’s legal punishment, but the hearing gave Loder’s family a public opportunity to redirect attention toward the person who died. Greg Loder described his father not through the acreage or money that figured in the motive, but through ordinary acts of generosity and the place he held among relatives and neighbors. A memorial site created for Loder became another reminder of that life. Flowers and messages marked the community’s response as the investigation and prosecution continued. The attendance at his celebration of life, his son told the court, demonstrated the number of people who believed they had been helped or influenced by him.
Greg Loder said the family would not stop talking about his father. That promise contrasted with the long period in which official records necessarily reduced Loder to a missing person, a homicide victim and the beneficiary of a disputed estate. With the criminal case complete, relatives said they could again place his work, relationships and character at the center of his story.
Lawrence’s concurrent sentences leave him serving a controlling 50-year term, minus the time credited by the court. For Loder’s family, sentencing did not erase the killing or restore the years they expected to have with him. It did, however, end the immediate cycle of hearings and allow them to move forward without waiting for the next stage of the prosecution.
Author note: Last updated July 15, 2026.