Accused of pulling a gun and trying to fight multiple people at a bar early Saturday, a 27-year-old man now faces a five-year felony charge and three misdemeanors in Gillette Circuit Court.
Eduardo Juarez, 27, was refusing to leave Wyoming Downs as the establishment closed after 2 a.m. Saturday morning and had been goading other customers to fight him while exposing his 9 mm handgun, according to the evidentiary affidavit filed in his case.
Gillette Police Department and Wyoming Highway Patrol personnel both responded to the bar that morning. The state trooper arrived before the police officer to find Juarez fighting another man, and he physically separated them.
The man later told police that Juarez was repeatedly trying to fight him, so he eventually punched Juarez in the face several times.
Food Truck Lady
The man’s wife told police that Juarez had a gun and had been flashing it in the bar, but then gave the gun to someone in a silver SUV.
Police caught up to the woman driving the silver SUV.
She said she ran a food truck and Juarez was her customer, so she took his phone, wallet and keys at his request and stashed them in the pocket of her green jacket.
But officials also found a 9 mm handgun in her jacket with a round in the chamber, the hammer cocked and the safety turned off. The magazine was empty, the affidavit says.
The woman reportedly said she didn’t realize the gun had gotten into her jacket with Juarez’s other possessions.
What Gun?
When police confronted Juarez, he said he was having verbal altercations with several men at the bar whom he didn’t know. So he challenged them to a fight outside in the parking lot, the affidavit relates.
They went outside and fought, he reportedly said.
The affidavit says Juarez denied that he had a gun at the bar and said it was in his truck.
When police told him a witness saw him hand his gun to the woman in the SUV, Juarez reportedly said he had no knowledge of giving the woman his gun.
‘Leave It Alone, He Has A Gun’
The man who reportedly punched Juarez in the face told police that Juarez challenged him to a fight, but he pushed Juarez away.
When Juarez challenged the man to a fight again, the man punched Juarez in the face several times “to defend himself,” the affidavit says.
The man’s wife said Juarez had been taunting her and her friends, and the men in the group almost got in a fight with Juarez earlier that evening but one of the men said, “leave it alone, he has a gun.”
One of the men in that group told police that Juarez pulled a handgun out of his sweatshirt pocket at the bar, racked the slide back and held the gun outside of his sweatshirt.
The man wasn’t sure what Juarez was saying to him “due to a language barrier,” the affidavit relates.
The Charges
Juarez is charged with possession of a deadly weapon with unlawful intent, which is a felony punishable by up to five years in prison and $1,000 in fines.
He also faces misdemeanor charges of breach of peace, reckless endangering and unlawfully carrying a concealed weapon, which together are punishable by up to two years in jail and $2,250 in fines.
