A Glendo, Wyoming, man whose wife helped him dodge an aggravated assault conviction last year now faces numerous violent criminal charges for allegedly torturing and terrorizing her throughout two years of their marriage.
Daniel Leinweber, who is 59 this year, could spend up to life in prison if convicted on the 13-count array of aggravated assault and domestic battery charges against his wife.
His case ascended to the felony-level Platte County District Court on Wednesday. It includes allegations that Leinweber ran down his wife with a truck, pointed a loaded gun at her, thrust a knife at her, hurled her across a floor, tossed her down the hill, kicked her in the ribs and head, ground his fist into her teeth, raped her and yanked her head around by her hair.
Wife Asked Court To Drop Charges Last Time
The new charges come after a dismissed 2021 case that went to the Carbon County District Court in 2022.
In that case, authorities charged Leinweber with aggravated assault, domestic battery and marijuana possession for allegedly smashing his truck into his wife’s car and pushing her out of his truck onto the ground, while keeping a jar of marijuana inside his truck.
Converse County District Court Judge F. Scott Peasley ordered the case dismissed without prejudice June 27, 2022, meaning prosecutors could bring the case again.
The order followed a motion by Converse County deputy attorney Shawn G. Wilde requesting dismissal, at Leinweber’s wife’s request.
But That’s Enough
This time, the case looks different.
Leinweber’s wife supplied a lengthy statement to Platte County Sheriff’s Office Deputy Mason Stillwell this spring — and she filed for divorce.
The earliest reported attack was about June 10, 2021, when Leinweber’s wife said he was cheating on her, according to an affidavit by Platte County Sheriff’s Deputy Mason Stillwell filed in Wheatland Circuit Court on April 24.
The wife fled. As she drove toward the interstate, Leinweber caught up to her in his truck and blocked the road so she couldn’t get onto the interstate, the affidavit says. Then he allegedly got out of his truck and aimed a pistol at her face.
She threw her car in reverse and tried to back away.
Somehow, the affidavit doesn’t say how, the pair later reunited. She brought up the pistol incident.
“I wasn’t going to pull the trigger,” Leinweber allegedly protested.
A Fight About Cheating
By Nov. 7, 2021, the pair were again fighting about his suspected cheating.
The wife tried to leave in her car, but Leinweber took her keys and wouldn’t let her leave, the affidavit alleges.
She set out for the interstate on foot.
He caught up with her in his truck tried to run her over, the document claims, so she ran until she ran out of energy and couldn’t run anymore.
He took her phone and went home, the wife told law enforcement.
But she kept going and made it to the interstate, where a deputy intercepted her and drove her back to her home to get her car.
Paying Your Ex-Wife?
Leinweber’s wife on about April 17, 2022, approached her husband about having sent “thousands of dollars to his ex-wife,” the affidavit claims.
“Next thing she knew she was being thrown across the kitchen floor,” the document continues, adding that she hit the corner of the cabinet with her face and shoulder and couldn’t speak or move for a few minutes.
Leinweber told her to get up, the woman recalled in her later police interview.
She couldn’t get up.
So he allegedly started kicking her in the head and stomach then dragged her across the cement floor to the bedroom until her knees bled.
The affidavit next describes two alleged rapes.
‘Spend More Time With Your Son’
On about June 1, 2022, Leinweber chased his wife with a silver-bladed knife, the affidavit claims, because she told him, “You should spend more time with your son.”
She tried to jump over the sectional but didn’t manage to clear it.
Leinweber jumped over the top of the couch, got onto her with the knife in his hand, the affidavit alleges, and thrust the knife toward her with stabbing motions several times while saying he was going to kill her.
He kept his left fist pressed against her face, grinding it so hard against her that it broke her dentures, the woman later told police.
“I begged him to, ‘Please stop doing this in front of your son,’” the wife related.
“F*** that, he has seen it already,” Leinweber allegedly replied.
Downhill Now
The wife left the house about July 25, 2022, because Leinweber was in “a mood,” says the affidavit.
He chased her down and shoved her down a hill “as hard as he could,” the document claims.
While she lay on the ground, he allegedly kicked her in the ribs twice.
She was wearing shorts that day. Deep cuts and scratches to her legs became swollen and painful over the next month, and her ribs hurt for at least a month as well, she said.
‘Like My Hair Is Separating From My Scalp’
On about March 5, 2023, Leinweber’s wife didn’t want to talk to him, and that made him upset, says the affidavit.
He jumped onto the bed and grabbed her hair, “as he always does when he is angry,” the document claims, and began to whip her head around while holding onto her hair before forcing her head sideways onto a pillow.
She thought he’d broken her neck, she told police later.
But she didn’t seek medical treatment. Her neck was still hurting when she filed for divorce, the document indicates.
The deputy asked the woman what it feels like when Leinweber uses her hair to whip her head around.
“It feels like my hair is separating from my scalp,” she said.
‘I Tell Him He Is Right, And I Am Wrong’
Leinweber approached his wife yelling on about March 15, 2023, the affidavit claims.
“What is wrong with you?” he allegedly shouted, calling her a “zombie” and another, derogatory insult for women.
He allegedly grabbed the hair on the right side of her head and yanked her off the couch, placing her on the floor, then drove his knee into her stomach with his weight behind it.
He strangled her with both hands until she couldn’t breathe, the affidavit claims.
“When Daniel gets angry, I try to leave or tell him that he is right, and I am wrong,” the woman said during her police interview. “I started agreeing with him, saying, ‘I am sorry,’ and ‘Please do not hurt me.’”
Flying NyQuil
The wife brought groceries home about March 30, 2023, the affidavit says.
Leinweber yelled something about eggs from the living room, she recalled.
The document says she started walking toward the door to leave, and he threw a newly-purchased bottle of NyQuil at the back of her head, causing bruising.
Back In 2021
The aggravated assault charge the Converse County court dismissed last year dated back to Dec. 13, 2021.
Converse County Deputy Corey Dwyer at that time responded to reports that a truck was trying to T-bone a passenger car at the Broken Wheel Truck Stop in Douglas.
The truck fled before Dwyer arrived, and when he saw the truck driving away, Dwyer struggled over icy roads to catch up to it.
But then, the truck sped back into the Broken Wheel parking lot.
Dwyer asked Leinweber, who was driving the truck, what had happened.
Leinweber said he smashed into his wife’s car by accident because of the poor road conditions, the affidavit from that case says.
Leinweber seemed drunk, Dwyer noted. Police later found an open beer and marijuana in his truck, the affidavit claims.
Another officer interviewed Leinweber’s wife and noticed immediately that her face was red and swelling.
She said Leinweber punched her in the face while she was still in the truck with him, and that he’d made her get into the truck.
Woman Flying
Dwyer reviewed the truck stop’s surveillance and watched Leinweber’s wife fall from the truck and on her back onto the ground unnaturally, the affidavit says.
Leinweber later said that she “flew” from the truck.
A witness said it looked at one point like a truck was trying to T-bone the car but missed, then rammed into the back of the passenger car.
Dwyer took Leinweber to the Converse County Detention Center.
Because, Marriage
When Leinweber pleaded not guilty to those charges on Feb. 17, 2022, his defense attorney Derek Thrall urged the judge to let Leinweber have more contact with his wife during the case.
Leinweber had been allowed to text his wife about marital property matters, but not to call her or discuss other things.
And it was Leinweber’s wife, said Thrall, who was insisting she be allowed to visit with her husband.
“These two folks have a prevailing interest in keeping their marriage together and working on their marriage,” said the defense attorney.
The prosecutor said it was a bad idea.
“(She’s) the victim in this case and there concern about having the suspect in this case be contacting the victim in his matter,” said Wilde.
Within Leinweber’s “minimal” criminal history there was a 2015 reckless endangering conviction for hitting someone with his vehicle, Wilde continued. And at that time Leinweber also faced a domestic abuse allegation — but he didn’t get convicted on it.
The judge denied Leinweber’s request at that hearing, allowing him only to text his wife about property matters.
In This Case Now
In the current case pending in Platte County District Court, Leinweber faces 13 charges. Those are:
Three counts of aggravated assault and battery, each punishable by up to 10 years in prison and $10,000 in fines;
Seven counts of domestic battery, each punishable by up to six months in jail and $750 in fines;
Two counts of first-degree sexual assault, each punishable by between five and 50 years in prison;
One count of strangulation of a household member, punishable by up to five years in prison and $10,000 in fines.
The case is ongoing.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
