Daily Darwin

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Cowboy State Daily is Wyoming’s largest newspaper with Wyoming’s most experienced journalists. 

<title>Daily Darwin: Sunday, March 5, 2023 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

All we can do is hope that nothing goes wrong...

Daily Darwin: Sunday, March 5, 2023

Mac Watson

Daily Video News

It’s time to take a look at what’s happening around Wyoming for Friday, June 26th.  I’m Mac Watson

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Idaho is switching from lethal injections to firing squad executions on July 1st. Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports that Wyoming won’t be changing its execution methods any time soon. 

“This does not affect Wyoming right now, because we don't have anyone on death row, and we rarely execute anyone. We haven't executed anyone since 1992 but it came up in 2014 when Dale Wayne Eaton was on death row before he had, before his death sentence had basically fizzled on appeal. We didn't have a gas chamber, which is our fail-safe method if lethal injection is unconstitutional, and the lethal injection drugs were scarce nationwide, and so Bruce Burns, who was a state senator at the time, was like, What are we going to do here if we can't get the drugs and we don't know the gas chamber, and so he made a bill that would have if the lethal injection wasn't available, that would have allowed for firing squad. That bill tried twice to get into the legislature and failed both times.”

Idaho is spending $1.2 million to retrofit an execution chamber for its new firing squad method, the 

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A sex solicitation sting in Cheyenne led to the arrest of two men last weekend. Cowboy State Daily’s Kerry Drake reports that Laramie County Sheriff Brian Kozak says it’s the beginning of a new effort to stop human trafficking that has been ignored for too long by law enforcement.

“Sheriff Kozak says that for too long, Laramie County, and particularly Cheyenne, have been a safe haven for sex trafficking, and he said it's going to stop now. This is the first operation that they've had in many years with the Laramie County Sheriff when he was the chief of police in Cheyenne about 10 years ago. He said he wanted to train everybody, at 240 people on the staff, including civilians, and he wanted everybody training, and so they've brought in experts from around the country to do that, and they had one here yesterday.”

Sheriff Kozak tells Cowboy State Daily that the department has noticed an increase in trafficking, particularly in Cheyenne, because of Cheyenne Frontier Days, and the amount of interstates that run through Laramie County.

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President Trump announced Thursday he will attend the July 3 fireworks celebration at Mount Rushmore, commemorating America's 250th. Cowboy State Daily’s Kate Meadows reports that the event also marks the return of fireworks over Mount Rushmore for the first time in six years.

“Trump coming to Mount Rushmore is a big deal in South Dakota. There will be tight security, a lot of security. Roads will be closed, and the last time he came in 2020 there was quite a protest by the Native American community who contend that Mount Rushmore was never there by permission, and the Black Hills belong to them. President Trump was personally invited to Mount Rushmore for this Fourth of July holiday by South Dakota Governor Larry Rhoden. Trump will also be at the opening for the Theodore Roosevelt National Library in North Dakota a few days prior.”

The announcement was made on the Freedom 250 website and confirmed in a statement released by South Dakota Gov. Larry Rhoden.

Wyoming lawmakers met in Lander on Thursday to address School Finance Recalibration. Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports that they repeatedly  promised a crowded room that they would fix a $3.9 million decrease in public school sports and activities funding.

“The school districts as a whole are facing like nearly $4 million in activity shortfalls. The brunt of that is actually on the high school side, whereas middle school and elementary are actually gaining money. And so the high schools are bearing this huge activity shortfalls, and that affects different schools and districts differently. So, lawmakers of the recalibration committee faced a crowded room Thursday in Lander of people who were lamenting these losses, and they promised, ‘Look, we're going to fix it, but we don't know how yet.’”

Committee members and staffers floated multiple different strategies for fixing the problem. The committee meets again Aug. 25 in Cheyenne.

I’ll have more news from Cowboy State Daily right after this.

Cowboy State Daily News continues now….

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A Texas man is accused of exposing his penis in the parking lot of a busy Mexican restaurant in Jackson on Tuesday evening before driving away intoxicated. Cowboy State Daily’s Kolby Fedore reports that if convicted on all four counts he could face up to 3½ years in jail.

“Police were dispatched to a Mexican restaurant in Jackson called El Abuelito just before 8pm after a Texas man had allegedly exposed himself to the public. One witness at the scene recorded part of the incident with her cell phone, she gave that over to police, so that they could review the video. Police could see him kissing a woman, and then he unbuttoned his pants and exposed himself. They arrested him under suspicion of driving under the influence when they took him into custody and took an inventory of his truck. They also found psilocybin mushrooms, along with a little bit of marijuana and a grinder.”

Durkas appeared Wednesday in Teton County Circuit Court, where he was arraigned on one count each of public indecency and driving under the influence, along with two misdemeanor counts of possessing controlled substances.

Facing extreme drought in the wake of an exceptionally mild winter, officials in Colorado and Oregon have told anglers at some reservoirs: Catch all the fish you want, because they’re going to die anyway. Cowboy State Daily’s Mark Heinz reports that here in Wyoming, emergency measures are on hold.

“I reached out to a couple people in Wyoming. Well, two of our biggest reservoirs here, Boysen and Flaming Gorge, they said, ‘Our water’s down, but we're not, we're nowhere near that level.’ The guy at Boysen told me that Boysen is still 73% full. But our picture is far from rosy. There's a million acre feet that are still scheduled to be pulled out of Boysen, or pardon me, Flaming Gorge Reservoir to replenish the really hard shortage of water they're having down at Lake Powell.”

Fisheries management coordinator Mark Smith tells Cowboy State Daily that some of Wyoming’s larger reservoirs have conservation pools, or “dead pools,” to act as buffers for fisheries when water is running low. He also added that Game and Fish is watching closely for a “tipping point” that might warrant a change in fishing regulations.

Rep. Harriet Hageman is vowing to continue the fight for her bill which mandates country-of-origin labeling for beef. But Cowboy State Daily’s Kate Meadows reports that’s despite the Senate Ag Committee's failure to include it in the Farm Bill. 

“Hageman pushed for this amendment in order to allow American consumers to understand where their beef comes from, and she saw it as a way to give ranchers fair competition. Other people, including ranchers and others in the beef producing industry, do not support this because they say it just adds too much bureaucracy, and there is no clear direction as to who would pay to monitor for this, and it's just one extra step with government that we don't need.”

Had the bill become law, it would require meat labels to clearly state where an animal was born, raised and slaughtered. 

Police say two Cheyenne men looking for “more privacy” wound up in the Crown Bar's employee-only basement. Cowboy State Daily’s Kolby Fedore reports that’s  where one “donkey kicked” a locked liquor room door and then stuffed three bottles of tequila in his pants before they were caught.

“23-year-old Casey Fox and 18-year-old Carlos Glaub were making out in a bathroom stall when they decided to go find some privacy, so that's how they ended up in the basement when Glaub reportedly donkey kicked the door open so that they could get into the liquor shed, where he was reportedly putting the tequila in his pants.”

Fox pleaded guilty on Monday to criminal entry, which is a misdemeanor. Glaub is facing a felony count of burglary, which is punishable by up to 10 years in prison.

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And that’s today’s news. Get your free digital subscription to Wyoming's only statewide newspaper by hitting the Daily Newsletter button on 

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 channel, or listen to us on your favorite podcast app.  Thanks for watching - I’m Mac Watson, for Cowboy State Daily.

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<title>Cowboy State Daily Video Newscast: Friday, June 26, 2026 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Friday's headlines include:
* Firing Squad Is Back
* Trump Will Go To Rushmore
* Cheyenne Is Human Trafficking Haven

Cowboy State Daily Video Newscast: Friday, June 26, 2026

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily's general assignment reporter, Clair McFarland.

Clair McFarland

Government & Politics

Legislature

Wyoming lawmakers meeting Thursday in Lander promised a crowded room repeatedly that they would fix a $3.9 million decrease in public school sports and activities funding that shocked parents and schools this spring.

The Legislature passed its new $2-billion-per year school funding model in March. A mix of hated and beloved changes have roiled the school districts. For example, teachers are on track for a roughly 12.8% raise, while other needs and wants have taken a hit.

The package’s architects voiced surprise in May, when the Wyoming High School Activities Association dispatched a plan for dealing with the $3.9 million activities shortfall that involved cutting sports, reducing travel and other reductions.

“I can tell you quite frankly that parents in Lander, myself included, are really aggravated about this,” said one parent, Randy Weisz, at the Thursday meeting of the Wyoming Legislature’s Select Committee on School Finance Recalibration, held in Lander’s school district central building.

“Lander’s taken a hit, but I had no idea what all these other schools were getting hit with. My son said, ‘They should be really mad,’ and I completely agree with that.”

Committee Co-Chair Rep. Scott Heiner, R-Green River, reassured meeting attendees repeatedly that the committee seeks to fix the issue.

“In my mind and I think in the mind of most of the committee members here, activities are an extension of the classroom,” said Heiner. “It provides benefit for our students and we don’t want to stop that. We don’t want to deemphasize how important activities are for our students.”

Committee members and staffers floated multiple different strategies for fixing the problem.

Those range from putting activities costs into the rigid but well-funded “silo” of money the Legislature has reserved for classroom teaching costs, reverting to the old activities funding model but adding a 5% increase, or letting school districts choose the more generous of the old activities model and the new one.

The committee didn’t adopt one method Thursday. It meets again Aug. 25 in Cheyenne.

[{"type":"text","text":"Now For The Numbers"}]

Laramie County School District 1 – the state’s largest – is on track to lose more than $600,000 for activities. Lincoln County School District 2, based in the Star Valley region, is on track to lose $400,000.

Not all districts are losing money: 26 are slated for increases and 22 for decreases.

That’s because the new funding model doles out money for activities based on district population, not schools.

Anticipating that smaller schools have less economy of scale for propping up activities programs, the model historically has given more money for smaller schools and less for larger ones, on a per-student basis, 

 by Legislative Service Office fiscal deputy administrator Matt Willmarth.

But now the Legislature gives money based on the whole district’s population, not each school’s population.

So if a larger district contains a far-flung, tiny high school of 45 students, apart from its bigger high school of 1,000 students, the little high school still gets less per-student allocation for activities because it sits within a populous district.

That’s what happened to Cokeville’s high school within Lincoln County School District No. 2, multiple people testified Thursday.

“This legislation created a $130,000 hole in Cokeville that would have killed all activities in Cokeville within a single year,” said school principal Kenneth Dietz, who appeared via virtual link.

Dietz and other school administrators who addressed the committee over the two-day meeting thanked lawmakers for giving classroom instructors such substantial raises.

But they also lamented – resoundingly and on both days – that they can’t pull money from the instructional silo to fund other areas that may be suffering shortfalls.

Dietz voiced the same thoughts. He said the teachers at Cokeville have been willing to see money go toward activities that they knew were helping kids.

Other administrators cast it as tension-inducing, that their classroom educators are slated for big raises while other staffers aren’t.

[{"type":"text","text":"This One’s An Oldie"}]

The teacher silo is the culmination of an old struggle between the Legislature and the education sector. 

Lawmakers hear that teachers need more money, or that schools need more money to hire teachers. So they furnish more money to the districts.

In multiple cases, the money goes “sideways” – as House Speaker Chip Neiman would say – into other areas of education.

To be fair, Sen. Chris Rothfuss, D-Laramie, has told Cowboy State Daily in the past, those other areas have seen shortfalls as well.

Johnson County School District No. 1 Board Chair Travis Pearson echoed that Thursday.

“The same year we got the 8.5% raise to the teacher based (salaries), utilities got bumped 11%,” Pearson said.

Some committee members voiced reluctance to abandon the classroom silo. It's been a great compromise that carried the new funding package, committee Co-Chair Sen. Tim Salazar, R-Riverton, told the public Wednesday. 

"If I had to do a recalibration over again, I'd do it again," Salazar said. "Those salary increases had to occur. And if you monitor the state legislative process on recalibration, it was not at all certain (they  would have)."

Administrators gave varying answers on the extent to which the raises in the teacher silo would have reached the teachers without that restriction. 

that they didn't foresee the activities shortfall.

Willmarth said that this new method was known in January while they were sculpting the new spending package, but schools didn't voice outrage over it because the teacher silo - locking funds that could cover the shortfall - wasn't yet cemented into the legislation. 

[{"type":"text","text":"Mike Yin’s Idea"}]

House Minority Floor Leader Mike Yin, D-Jackson, offered the idea of letting districts use whichever model was more generous: the old one that funded activities based on the school’s population, or the new one funding them based on the full district’s population.

Most of Wyoming’s high schools suffer under the new model, and high school activities are slated for a $5.9 million reduction statewide.  

Middle schools gain $1.69 million and elementary schools gain $340,845, however, which is why the total decrease for activities shakes out to $3.87 million.

[{"type":"text","text":"Smaller districts with fewer schools benefit from the new model."}]

Niobrara School District No. 1, based in Lusk, is set for a nearly 30% increase to activities funding.

Goshen County School District No. 1 is set for the biggest decrease, percentage-wise, at 30% less for activities. Lincoln County School District No. 2 is next, at about a 28% drop.

Brian Farmer, executive director of the Wyoming School Boards Association, told lawmakers that even with Yin’s proposition, schools might still fall short.

That’s because schools have pulled from other budget categories to fund activities above what the model allocates and recommends.

In school year 2024-25, the districts spent $4.3 million more on activities than the Legislature envisioned and allocated.

So right now with the $3.9 million reduction and the freezing of “siloed” instructional money that once helped cover the districts’ $4.3 million boost, the activities bracket is falling closer to $7 million shy of the school system’s past provision, said Farmer.

Wyoming’s courts require the Legislature to adopt a cost-based funding model for public K-12 schools due largely to the state Constitution’s promise of a complete and uniform education system.

Rothfuss urged school administrators to communicate with lawmakers about shortfalls and excesses.

“You’re telling us we don’t provide enough funding: where? Let’s see the details of the expenditures versus the funding model spreadsheet you’re generating,” he said. “Get us that data so we can start to understand where we’ve fallen short in these categories.”

Rothfuss in February advanced significant changes to the new funding  model so that it provided more money for electives and other offerings, but so that some areas – like insurance costs – anchored more directly to each district’s demands.

Senate President Bo Biteman, R-Ranchester, worried aloud that Yin’s proposition strayed from the court-mandated mission of the Legislature.

“Not to throw cold water on it,” Biteman said. “You know I just want to make sure we’re evidence-based and cost-based here, not just going on what feels good.”

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<title>Wyoming Lawmakers Start Work To Fix $3.9 Million School Activities Shortage | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Wyoming Lawmakers Start Work To Fix $3.9 Million School Activities Shortage

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily political columnist, Rod Miller.

Rod Miller

Opinion

CSD Columnists

They shouldered their way into Wyoming politics a few years ago, proclaiming a gnarly populist gospel of “grassroots” change as preached by a national organization from back East. They gained control of the Wyoming House while we weren’t paying attention. 

The Wyoming Freedom Caucus’ two years in power have exposed their fumbling ineptitude, their disconnect with the values of Wyoming citizens, and their continuing lust for power. Their performance has doomed their movement and, after 8/18/26, they will be nothing more than a minor footnote to Wyoming’s political history.

When its members gained a majority in the Wyoming House in 2024, the Freedom Caucus took control of the legislative committees that map out the future of our state. They introduced a legislative agenda intended to transform the Cowboy State into the Biggest Booger Farm in the World.

Had they succeeded, the “Welcome to Wyoming” signs that greet visitors at our borders would have been replaced with rusted cars on cinder blocks and bathtubs full of empty beer cans.

The Freedom Caucus frittered away the first season of interim committee work crafting legislation addressing the pressing problems of UFOs and chemtrails (henceforth, they shall be known as the Chemtrail Caucus) and boneheaded ideas to sell our state land for a dollar an acre to latter day homesteaders.

They had a plan to “Nickel and Dime” our small, remote communities into subservience to central control in Cheyenne. Rep. John Bear, a Chemtrail Caucus poster boy, even said that he wouldn’t be heartbroken if small towns in the Big Empty simply dried up and blew away.

From banning books to keeping women barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen, the Chemtrail Caucus’ vision for us resembled nothing so much as the Sharia Law of the West. They even tried to cut $40 million from the University of Wyoming, home of the Cowboys, simply because they didn’t appreciate the rigorous intellectual inquiry that occurs at a major institution of higher learning.

[{"type":"text","text":"But wait, there’s more! "}]

The Chemtrail Caucus even managed to have campaign checks hand delivered to themselves on the floor of the Wyoming house by Rebecca Bextel on behalf of a rich donor from Teton County in the “Checkgate" scandal. There is an ongoing criminal investigation into that hilarious debacle. 

[{"type":"text","text":"How’s that for Wyoming Values?"}]

When their legislative agenda was thwarted by the Wyoming Senate or the courts, the Chemtrail Caucus whined like a gutshot goose, and called their opponents RINOs or “leftist activist judges," and now they are trying to take control of both. They go so far as to say that the Wyoming Supreme Court should be reduced to three black robes instead of five, presumably so the court can be more easily manipulated.

The current gang-warfare style of our politics, whereby we are told to think of ourselves less as Republican and Democrat neighbors and more as the Crips and Bloods fighting over turf, is about the only tangible Chemtrail Caucus gift to Wyoming. And, if I am reading the political tea leaves correctly, I think the good people of Wyoming are getting sick and tired of Chemtrail Caucus bullshit.

Good, solid Wyoming citizens are rising up to run against Caucus incumbents this election season. 

The real grassroots of Wyoming seem to be pushing back against the herbicide that the Chemtrail Caucus is spraying on us. Folks are seeing through the smokescreen

The Chemtrail Caucus Ministry of Propaganda, that handful of shrill media outlets, isn’t matching its noise level with numbers. The flagship of this media “empire”, funded largely by Rebecca Bextel of “Checkgate” infamy, boasts of a whopping 250 subscribers. Cowboy State Daily, which you are reading now, has over 110,000 subscribers. 

The right wing "media" in Wyoming defines “echo chamber.” They represent a paper-thin slice of our state - the same angry voices, bouncing the same goofball rhetoric off the same narrow little walls. Nobody is paying them much attention.

In the competition for Wyoming’s eyes and ears, the Caucus is sucking hind tit.

For these and many other reasons, I think this will be a tough year for the Chemtrail Caucus. I’m comfortable enough in my analysis to have serious money out on the street, betting on the outcome of the next election. And I’m always willing to make more wagers with new suckers. 

So vote your conscience on 8/18/26, and peel an eye for my column on 8/21/26, where I’ll either eat crow or gloat in front of 110,000 people.

Rod Miller can be reached at: RodsMillerWyo@yahoo.com

Rod miller headshot scaled

<title>Rod Miller:  A Bleak Future for the Chemtrail Caucus | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Columnist Rod Miller writes, "The Wyoming Freedom Caucus’ two years in power have exposed their fumbling ineptitude, their disconnect with the values of Wyoming citizens, and their continuing lust for power. Their performance has doomed their movement."

Rod Miller:  A Bleak Future for the Chemtrail Caucus

Kerry Drake

Crime & Courts

Laramie County Sheriff Brian Kozak says stopping human sex trafficking is a new agency priority because for too long Cheyenne has been a “safe haven” for this form of modern slavery.

An undercover operation in Cheyenne led by two detectives resulted in two arrests for soliciting acts of prostitution last weekend. Kozak said the effort is the first in many years for his office, but he promised there will be more.

“People come to Cheyenne to make those (prostitution) arrangements because everyone knew there was no enforcement,” Kozak told Cowboy State Daily.

“But it’s a hard thing to recover women in the trade. Because there’s so much pressure on them, whether it’s drug addiction or physical abuse. Actually the situation that they’re in, sometimes it’s better than their real home life.”

Kozak said that 10 years ago, when he was Cheyenne police chief, his department began undercover operations to arrest human traffickers when he noticed the online activity was extremely high in Cheyenne.

“I went to my sergeant who ran the undercover unit and told him I wanted them to all go to human trafficking training because I think we have a problem in Cheyenne,” the sheriff said.

Kozak said the sergeant didn’t believe him until he did some research and looked at Craigslist and some other sites. 

“He said, ‘Oh my God, we do have a major spike here',” he recalled. “We started to make some great cases against traffickers, or what the industry might call a pimp.” 

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"}],"text":"A Costly Operation"}]

It takes lots of time and money for law enforcement to try to stop human sex trafficking, which is rarely prosecuted in Wyoming. Often the crimes are charged as sexual assault or child abuse.

In addition to overtime, the department had to buy cameras for undercover operations, have “buy money” available for stings, and create ads online. 

“Then the investigations themselves can take us out of state as well,” Kozak said. 

Successful results are difficult to gauge.

Kozak said his office was successful in helping some women leave the sex trade, but it didn’t happen until after investigations were completed and the women came to them.

“We have the resources to help them, we have housing, and that’s the goal for these operations,” he said. 

He said the police stings ended when he left the Cheyenne Police Department because the next administration didn’t make human trafficking a priority. 

“As sheriff, I’m bringing it back again,” Kozak said.

He said trafficking spikes during Cheyenne Frontier Days, which typically brings about 200,000 visitors for the 10-day event.

“During this first (sheriff’s) operation we focused on demand reduction, or what you would call ‘johns', because it’s easier than recovering men in the sex trade,” Kozak noted. “The detectives learned a lot and will change some things when they do that type of operation.”   

But the focus will shift soon to trying to find women and young girls in the sex trade as well, Kozak said, by using "reverse stings.” Undercover officers will pose as men wanting to pay for sex acts.

“We’ve trained every single person in the sheriff’s office; all 240 including the civilian staff, have all been trained in human sex trafficking,” Kozak said. “I wanted them to know that was our goal, to reduce the problem here.” 

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"}],"text":"All Personnel Trained"}]

Instead of sending a few detectives to training sessions, Kozak said experts came to Cheyenne. One such session was Tuesday, where assessments were made about what went right and wrong during the first sting.

“What we’re planning to do is take the money we’ve received from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and roll it back to pay for the human-trafficking enforcement,” he said.

The sheriff’s office under Kozak’s command signed controversial agreements with ICE last year to deputize local law-enforcement agencies to perform duties otherwise conducted by federal immigration agents. That included arresting and holding people in the county jail until they’re moved to a federal detention center.

In the future, undocumented immigrants arrested through agreements with ICE might be in jail in Cheyenne with sex traffickers who were captured by local law enforcement using funds from the federal agency.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Wyoming sued the Laramie County Sheriff’s Office in May, contending the agency didn’t follow Wyoming law when it signed the agreements.

The first two men the sheriff’s office arrested for alleged solicitation of an act of prostitution were David Drehbol and Christopher Miller, both of Cheyenne. The sheriff’s office identified Drehbol as a registered sex offender who was convicted in 2007 for unlawful sexual contact in Colorado.

The National Human Trafficking Hotline (NHTH) tracks sex cases in every state. The NHTH works closely with service providers, law enforcement, and other professionals in Wyoming to serve victims and survivors of trafficking, respond to trafficking cases, and share information and resources. 

Since the organization’s inception in 2007, it has 

identified 148 cases of human trafficking

Sex trafficking activity is difficult to track and prosecute. But Terri Markham, executive director of Uprising, a statewide anti-human trafficking group based in Sheridan, estimated Wyoming likely generates $12 million a year from pimp-controlled sex trafficking alone. 

Cara Chambers,Wyoming Division of Victim Services director, told the 

 that Wyoming is susceptible to this type of organized crime. She said Wyoming’s rural population and vast land mass result in many places where traffickers can set up operations undetected.

A large interweb of interstate highways also connects people to some of the biggest hubs in the West. 

“There’s a bit of a circuit that these traffickers will take their victims through to Las Vegas and up in California, and it goes through Wyoming,” Chambers said.

The Department of Homeland Security defines human trafficking as the use of force, fraud or coercion to obtain some type of labor or commercial sex act.

If you or someone you know is experiencing human trafficking, contact the national human trafficking hotline at 1-888-373-7888 or your local law enforcement office.

Kerry Drake can be reached at: Kerry@CowboyStateDaily.com

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<title>Sheriff Says Laramie County Will Stop Being ‘Safe Haven’ For Human Trafficking | Cowboy State Daily</title>

A sex solicitation sting in Cheyenne led to the arrest of two men last weekend. Laramie County Sheriff Brian Kozak says it’s the beginning of a new effort to stop human trafficking that has been ignored for too long by law enforcement.

Sheriff Says Laramie County Will Stop Being ‘Safe Haven’ For Human Trafficking

Next week Idaho will adopt the firing squad as its primary execution method due to availability and failure problems with lethal injection. 

A lawmaker tried to give Wyoming a firing squad option while the state still had a convicted rapist and murderer on death row in 2014, but the bill didn’t clear the Legislature. 

Wyoming law calls for executions by lethal injection. If lethal injection is found unconstitutional, the state can use a gas chamber.

Dale Wayne Eaton, the “Li’l Miss” killer, was convicted in 2004 for kidnapping, raping and murdering Lisa Marie Kimmell 16 years earlier in Wyoming. The jury called for the death penalty.

But in 2014, while Eaton’s appeal was ongoing, many states were running short of the chemicals to perform lethal injections.  

“So we may have had a problem coming up with the drugs needed for the execution,” 

Burns, a Republican of Sheridan, told Cowboy State Daily in a Thursday phone interview.

It would be expensive to build a gas chamber, Burns reasoned, adding, “I always thought gas chamber the most gruesome form of execution anyway.”

[{"type":"text","text":"It doesn’t have to be that expensive, Burns countered."}]

“I don’t know that you’d necessarily need to build a room,” he said. “Even if you did, it could just be cinderblocks.”

[{"type":"text","text":"The Eaton case fizzled in the years that followed."}]

A federal district court judge overturned his death sentence in 2014 because defense lawyers hadn’t pursued a mental-health defense despite Eaton’s mental-health problems.

Prosecutors said they intended to seek the death penalty again on the re-trial, and the trial court ordered a mental evaluation. Then in his mid-70s, Eaton had suffered strokes, dementia and depression, and the trial court found him incompetent to stand trial.

Prosecutors withdrew the death penalty case in 2021 and he was re-sentenced to life in prison the next year.

[{"type":"text","text":"Now 81, Eaton remains in Wyoming's prison system.  "}]

Burns’ 2014 bill made national headlines and surfaced on late-night commentator Stephen Colbert’s show.

“This was back when (Colbert) played the faux conservative,” recalled Burns. “It had a picture of me with the graphic ‘thrift justice.’”

The Senate rejected the bill 17-13 on its introductory vote. In even-numbered years, non-budget bills require a two-thirds vote to clear introduction and enter the chamber.

Burns’ legislation resurfaced as a Joint Judiciary Committee bill in 2015, when it had a longer trajectory.

It cleared the Senate and House of Representatives both. The House margin was narrow: 32-28.

Idaho is switching from lethal injections to firing squad executions on July 1. Wyoming almost added firing squad executions as an alternate method in 2014 because lethal injection drugs were scarce and 'Lil Miss' killer Dale Wayne Eaton was still on death row.

Daily Darwin: Sunday, March 5, 2023

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