Daily Darwin

[{"type":"text","text":"It really is a delightful day to go for a bike ride..."}]

Darwin 10 27 23

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

<title>Daily Darwin: Friday, October 27, 2023 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

It really is a delightful day to go for a bike ride...

Daily Darwin: Friday, October 27, 2023

 It really is a delightful day to go for a bike ride...

Jen kocher

Jen Kocher

Crime & Courts

Law Enforcement

For more than 30 years, the body of an unidentified woman discovered in the remote desert along Interstate 80 in rural Nevada has kept her secrets hidden.

The woman, known colloquially as “Shafter Jane Doe,” had been beaten and shot in the chest and back.

Her nude body was posed on the ground, arms extended to either side in the shape of a cross with legs slightly parted.

Less than a week after her death on Nov. 16, 1993, a geologist who had pulled off at the remote Shafter exit off I-80 to stretch his legs discovered her body, according to news reports from the time.

Later investigation in 2010 revealed that the woman had spent seven months in Afton, Wyoming, which was determined through the isotope testing. 

For years, her donated headstone has read, “Who Am I?”

Now more than 32 years after the gruesome discovery, authorities finally have an answer.  

Her name is Marion Hertha Alexander, who was a German immigrant who moved to California with her family in 1972.

After a decades-long investigation, members of the Elko County Sheriff’s Office and other law enforcement partners told the Elko County Commissioners on Thursday afternoon that they identified her through the use of advanced DNA testing and forensic genetic genealogy.

The decades-long investigation also revealed the woman was in Afton, Wyoming, for about seven months before she was murdered. 

Alexander left home around age 18, and her family told investigators that Alexander was a free spirit who liked to drift around.

Her family questioned where she had gone, but given her lifestyle, they did not report her missing to law enforcement.

Her living family members were notified of the identification in January of this year, Elko County Sheriff’s Office Lt. Douglas Fisher stated, and continue to be in touch with law enforcement.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"No Justice"}]

Her suspected murderer, however, will not see justice.

Authorities were closing in on Roger Lee Durkee of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, who was identified through semen found on a vaginal swab that yielded a full DNA profile, authorities said.

The profile was run through the FBI’s Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) but did not result in a match, so the Elko County Sheriff’s Office contracted a private group to perform forensic genetic genealogy analysis in February 2022 that led to Durkee as a potential suspect.

Further investigation indicated that Durkee was likely the murderer, but as detectives began planning their trip to Wisconsin to make an arrest, they learned that Durkee had died on Nov. 13, 2025.

He died within 14 days of detectives learning Alexander’s identity.

Now, however, Alexander will be properly laid to rest.

The Elko Sheriff’s Office asked the commission — and were granted — money to buy a proper headstone to finally put her to rest.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Piecing Together Mystery"}]

Authorities worked for decades to identify Alexander through the use of several forensic tools.

Initially when she was discovered, Alexander’s face was beaten beyond recognition, so the FBI created a computer-generated image of her likeness to help local authorities attempt to identify her, according to a 1993 article by the Elko Daily Free Press.

Along with her image, authorities had little else to go on.

They were able to extract a partial print from her right thumb, which did not find a match in any federal databases.

The only other identifying characteristics were what appeared to be a burn scar or birth mark on her right calf, pink fingernails that looked to be professionally done and a tooth that had undergone a partial root canal, according to the same article.

A portion of her skull was sent to the Minnesota State Crime Lab, according to reporting from the Casper-Star Tribune, where her DNA was extracted and run through databases with no match.

They turned to the media and a national crime show, but no viable leads to her identity were forthcoming.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Human Time Capsule"}]

A big break came nearly two decades later with the advancement of using stable isotopes that tracked Alexander to Afton, Wyoming.

This discovery came in 2010 when scientists at Utah State University were able to determine she had spent the past seven months in Afton by analyzing isotopes in her hair that traced her to the area.

Though not new science, this application of stable isotope analysis has transformed how law enforcement solves cold cases, said Christy Mancuso, an assistant research professor at the University of New Mexico and sales representative for Thermo Fisher Scientific.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"}],"text":"Mancuso knows the science well."}]

She got her doctorate degree in biology from the University of Utah and was affiliated with the stable isotope lab, where her thesis advisor, Jim Ehleringer, started the now-shuttered IsoForensics lab.

She wasn’t familiar with Alexander’s case, but said that stable isotope analysis is an excellent tool for helping to identify remains.

Essentially, humans are like time capsules of chemical information that are stored within one’s bones, teeth and hair, Mancuso said, which helps trace that person to a generalized location.

Humans living in these various regions incorporate the stable isotope signal from their drinking water and food that correlate to particular regions.

When forensic scientists analyze human remains, they examine the various stable isotopes — carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, hydrogen — that act as chemical signatures reflecting what a person consumed and where they lived during their lifetime, both recent and past.

Every geographical location has a unique chemical composition evident in its local water and food sources, soil composition and climate, Mancuso explained.

Researchers can then track these predictable geographical patterns using isotope maps called “isoscapes” to identify likely regions where that person lived or traveled.

Hair in particular, which was used to trace Alexander to the Afton area, serves as an excellent linear time recorder of isotope information because it grows at a predictable rate of about one centimeter per month and provides a chronological record in its keratin protein structure, Mancuso said.

In this case, isotopes in Alexander’s hair matched those in drinking water that suggested she’d lived in the that particular area of Wyoming for the past seven months.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Great Basin Murders"}]

Alexander is thought to be one of about nine victims killed between 1983 and 1997 across four states in the Great Basin geographical area that includes Wyoming, Utah, Nevada and Idaho, and dumped along interstates in the remote arid watershed.

Many had been sexually abused or assaulted and either strangled, shot or stabbed.

Some were posed like Alexander, including another Jane Doe found in rural Elko County in July 1972 who also had been shot twice with her body posed to resemble a cross.

Initially, it was thought that one serial killer might be responsible for all the deaths, but it was quickly determined that most the murders were committed by different people.

The first victim was thought to be 23-year-old Janelle Johnson, who was hitchhiking from Denver to Riverton in February 1983 and was last seen at a truck stop in Sinclair, Wyoming.

The aspiring model was found less than a month later in a shallow grave near Shoshoni, Wyoming, according to the national nonprofit Parents of Murdered Children.

 in March 1988, was also among the young women killed.

Her body was found floating in the North Platte River near Casper and it took until 2004 to bring her killer to justice.

Eaton had also been suspected in Alexander’s murder because he had reportedly lived in the Elko area at the time and had been arrested for domestic violence, according to a 2010 report by the Elko Daily Free Press.

One of the other Wyoming victims, who remained unidentified for years and was known as “Bitter Creek Betty,” was identified in 2025 as Irene Vasquez.

Both Vasquez, and Cindi Arleen Estrada, who had formerly been known as “I-90 Jane Doe,” 

were determined to be victims of Clark Perry Baldwin

Baldwin, a long-haul truck driver who was convicted of murdering a woman in 1991 in Tennessee, was 

Other victims affiliated with this geographic region and time period are Vicky Lynn Perkins, 19, who vanished from Oregon and whose body was found two months later off 1-70 in Emery County, Utah, in May 1989.

Two more victims were found within one month of each other in 1991.

The badly beaten deceased body of Ermalinda Garza Sherman was found in St. George, Utah, in April while a Jane Doe, later identified as Barbara Kaye Williams, was found in Salt Lake City in March.

Shafter Jane Doe inset 6 3 26

<title>32 Years After Her Posed Body Was Found Along I-80, ‘Shafter Jane Doe’ Identified | Cowboy State Daily</title>

More than 32 years after her body was found along I-80, the woman known as “Shafter Jane Doe” has been identified, officials announced Thursday. Her nude body was posed on the ground, arms extended to either side in the shape of a cross.

32 Years After Her Posed Body Was Found Along I-80, ‘Shafter Jane Doe’ Identified

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

Clair McFarland

Government & Politics

Politics

wo approaches to using artificial intelligence in K-12 schools clashed mildly this week 

as the Wyoming Joint Education Committee broached 

Some lawmakers and members of the public warned against unleashing the hazards and unknowns of the technology on teachers and students.

Subject-matter leaders in the Wyoming Department of Education reasoned, conversely, that AI is becoming so widespread that it’s wiser to help staffers and students use it responsibly.

The committee ultimately didn’t draft legislation 

, but questioned the department on next steps.

taff Dicky Shanor called the department’s approach “scenario planning.”

Nathan Tedjeske, chief of innovation at the department, said the agency is working from multiple angles to equip school districts, parents, and the department’s own people with guidance.

That includes creating trainings for teachers, school administrators and district staffers on, “What is this, how do you use it,” said Tedjeske.

“We’re on the side of like, be aware. We should have a foundational level of knowledge of how does this work and what does it mean for us in the school systems,” he added.

[{"type":"text","text":"Students Are Using It"}]

Tedjeske cautioned against ignoring the encroachment of AI into students’ lives, theorizing that students have access to it at home and should learn to use it responsibly.

He said 90% of student experience with AI is through less-than-ideal platforms like Facebook, Snapchat, and Instagram.

Schools should have a “quality vetting process,” he said, because, “The actual level of data security concerns involved with all this is pretty staggering.”

WDE’s digital learning program consultant Steven Priest “has done a great job” addressing student data pitfalls, added Tedjeske.

Concerns have surfaced around academic integrity and hazards of uneducated use, he said.

“When we don’t have the tools in place for the kids to learn how to use it ethically and responsibly … there’s a lot of security concerns,” he said. “So we’re working towards supplying tools to deal with that. We’re not there yet. But hopefully soon.”

On the department side, said Tedjeske, employees have been learning how to use AI as a time-saver, “so we’re spending less time on tedious tasks and more on school districts.”

[{"type":"text","text":"Tedjeske cast the multiplying tech as inevitable."}]

“We had cellphones and we said, ‘That’s not us, we don’t want to touch that.’ And then cellphones were done to us,” he said. “And social media came along, and we said, ‘That’s not us, we don’t want to touch that.’ And then social media was done to us.”

With AI looming, “Let’s be at the front of the conversation,” he said, adding that that means Wyoming would dictate to AI product vendors which needs are right for Wyoming’s kids, rather than established product vendors dictating priorities to a state behind the curve.

Tedjeske said some products can help teachers with seating charts and other logistics and “clerical” tasks.

Jenifer Hopkins, a Casper-area mom and school board member who said she was speaking on her own behalf, said she recognizes that the business sector will want people who can design and work with AI.

But young kids shouldn’t be mired in the tech’s distractions, she said.

“I don’t think they need it in the younger years,” said Hopkins. "I’d like us to start peeling back even from computer use.”

[{"type":"text","text":"Though some kids will go into AI, not all will."}]

“We’re not here to tell them how to think or what they’re supposed to be in life,” she said. “We’re supposed to give them the tools to decide that for themselves.”

“I think the job of a school is to create real intelligence,” said Andrew.

[{"type":"text","text":"This Sounds Important"}]

Sen. Charlie Scott, R-Casper, said the topic sounds “potentially quite important,” and asked the department to confirm its stance that the tech’s entrance into Wyoming’s K-12 system is inevitable.

If that’s the case, he added, “How do we go about reaching the parents?”

Scott also asked how the Legislature could prevent AI hazards that can harm kids.

Priest said the department is focusing initially on school administrators and teachers, but parent resources are available and the department’s goal is to build a course for parents to learn more about AI.

[{"type":"text","text":"“Yes, we’re working on that,” said Priest."}]

Rep. Tom Kelly, R-Sheridan, who is running to become the next state Superintendent of Public Instruction, voiced concerns as an educator.

[{"type":"text","text":"Those concerns include teachers as well as students."}]

“(I’m a) former public-school teacher and now I work at a university. I have grad-level students who appear to be losing the ability to critically think and problem-solve,” said Kelly. “Because they’ve become so adept at  having AI research for them, read for them, summarize, sometimes even read out loud to them.”

In classroom conversations, “a bit of atrophy in their cognitive functions” is noticeable, he added.

If teachers are using AI to deliver curriculum to students, they’re doing “less thinking” and relying on AI more, he said.

Kelly asked what the state Department of Education is doing to research product hazards.

[{"type":"text","text":"Same Level Of Concern"}]

Tedjeske said the department is on the same level of concern and doesn’t want to offload cognitive tasks.

“We’re very much on the side of human-in-the-loop with all this,” he said.

Tedjeske speculated that Kelly’s graduate school students didn’t get training before receiving “unfettered access” to AI, and that students should be trained beforehand.  

Sheridan School District No. 1 developed a guidance document for AI issues, said

 Fred Hollingshead, director for the district's Cowboy State Virtual Academy.

Guidance is more flexible than policy in the fast-paced tech world, he added.

The district has faced concerns with AI research tools being biased, and hallucinating.

Hollingshead said, “We share with students good uses of AI and bad uses of AI,” and discuss prohibited uses like plagiarism and surveillance.

Teachers’ AI detection programs will sometimes “throw out false positives” and wrongly flag a student’s work for AI use, he added.

“I would want this committee to know, your districts are on top of it,” said Hollingshead. “We are paying attention.”

Artificial intelligence 6 3 26

<title>Wyoming Department Of Education Says Prepare For AI — Because It's Coming | Cowboy State Daily</title>

The Wyoming Department of Education warned lawmakers this week that artificial intelligence is coming, so students should receive training outside of Facebook and Instagram. “The job of a school is to create real intelligence,” said Rep. Ocean Andrew.

Wyoming Department Of Education Says Prepare For AI — Because It's Coming

Heinz mark

Mark Heinz

Outdoors

Wildlife

With summer tourist activity hitting full pitch in Yellowstone National Park, and other black bears engaged in mating-season courtship, one bear apparently decided he’d just had enough and passed out for hours by the roadside near Tower Junction.

The bear sprawled on his back with his tongue hanging out and snoozed away the hot afternoon seemingly without a care in the world, blissfully ignoring traffic roaring by barely 30 yards away.

The bear zonked out so hard, some people worried that it was dead, park visitor and wildlife photographer Corey Pettis told Cowboy State Daily.

But the bear would occasionally stir, raise his head to look drowsily around before going back to sleep, said Pettis, who spent a couple of hours watching that bear and several others on May 28.

“It was a hot day. I think the temperature was up in the 80s,” which might explain why the bear was wise to find a shady spot and get some rest, even as other bears amorously chased each other around, he said.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Black Bear Hangout"}]

 has been getting plenty of attention in Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks this spring.

Around Tower Junction, it’s all about black bears, said Pettis, who lives in Wisconsin and has been visiting Yellowstone and Grand Teton every spring and fall for years.

“Over by Tower Falls is where the black bears all hang out. I’ve hardly ever seen a grizzly go through there,” he said.

Pettis said he saw nine black bears in the general area on May 28, including three others in the vicinity of the sleepy bear.

Those bears included at least one female that was being actively pursued by males trying to mate with her.

“Maybe he (the sleeping bear) had been out chasing that female earlier and was just tired,” he said.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Going Unnoticed"}]

Pettis said that the snoozing bear was one of the most amusing things he’s ever seen in the national parks.

Equally amusing is how unnoticed the bear was by many tourists.

“There were hundreds of people stopping and looking around,” attracted by the sight of the black bears that were up and moving, he said.

“But that sleeping bear was down so flat on the ground, many people didn’t even notice he was there,” he added.

That’s just as well, because nobody tried to push in too close and disrupt the bear’s slumber, he said.

“He was sleeping hard. I could just about picture the drool coming out of his mouth,” Pettis said.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"More Tolerant Of People"}]

Nicholas Scapillati, executive director of the Grizzly Bear Foundation in British Columbia, Canada, told Cowboy State Daily that he wasn’t particularly surprised to hear about a black bear sleeping soundly near so many people.

Generally speaking, black bears are “much more comfortable being closer to human settlements than grizzlies are,” he said.

Black bears evolved in heavily forested habitats and usually don’t need as much vast, undisturbed territory as grizzlies do, he said.

“Grizzlies need bigger habitats,” he said. "They need isolated alpine areas to den in."

So-called “roadside” grizzlies in Yellowstone and Grand Teton are mostly females with cubs, Scapillati said.

That’s because male grizzlies will sometimes kill a female’s cubs in hopes that the female will go back into heat so the male can mate with her.

Large male grizzlies tend to be less tolerant of crowds, and so the roadside grizzly mammas have learned to take their cubs near roadsides to lower risks, he said.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Bear Personalities"}]

While black bears might be more apt to get comfortable around crowds, grizzlies can get used to specific humans in the backcountry, Scapillati said.

He’s watched female grizzlies nursing their cubs in the wild, something those bears might not have been comfortable doing near crowds.

People also frequently underestimate how intelligent black bears and grizzlies are, Scapillati said.

They’re smart and complex enough to develop a wide range of personalities, he said.

It makes sense that the black bear Pettis watched snoozing near Tower Junction may have an unusually mellow personality, Scapillati said.

And in the parks, it might be possible for grizzlies to develop that level of comfort with crowds of tourists, he added.

“It’s probably a matter of time before somebody films a grizzly bear doing that (zonking out by the roadside),” he said.

Sleepy bear 6 3 26

<title>Tired Of Mobs And Mating Season, Yellowstone Black Bear Zonks Out By Roadside | Cowboy State Daily</title>

As Yellowstone buzzed with tourists and other bears were caught up in courtship, a black bear apparently decided he’d had enough and zonked out by the roadside near Tower Junction. The bear was out so hard, some people worried that it was dead.

Tired Of Mobs And Mating Season, Yellowstone Black Bear Zonks Out By Roadside

You Still Here

[{"type":"text","text":"Boy goes viral after sharing his bird mimicking talents...."}]

Birds 6 3 26

<title>Today In Birds: Wednesday, June 3, 2026 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Boy goes viral after sharing his bird mimicking talents....

Today In Birds: Wednesday, June 3, 2026

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily reporter, Jackie Dorothy.

Jackie Dorothy

Wyoming Life

Around Wyoming

John “Josh” Deane was 16 years old when he left his home in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania, for the Wild West in 1872, lured there by the adventures he had read about in the 10-cent novels of his day. 

Instead of the excitement he dreamed of, the teenager found life a struggle just to survive.

Deane eventually took a job for $75 a month driving freight, a profession known as "bull whacking." 

By 1876, Deane was 20 years old and landed an opportunity that he considered an advancement in life. 

He was hired as a government dispatch carrier at the princely sum of $125 a month. 

In 1928, Deane told his story to a biographer about he carried one especially important dispatch, related in his own words in the book “The Mayor of Meeteetse.” 

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Rumors Of A Fight"}]

Deane had arrived at Fort Brown in the middle of June 1876 and was told by Col. Julius Mason to remain a few days. 

Mason had just arrived himself from Fort Riley, Kansas, and was concerned because there were rumors of a fight with the Indians in the Rosebud country. 

“A little later, he decided to send me to the camp of Custer and Reno and told me to select an Indian to accompany me,” Deane said. “I picked Niogen Doget, a Shoshone, and we started out on the morning of June 24, with our saddle horses and one pack horse.”

The two men had orders to reach their destination as quickly as possible, so they traveled fast and light. 

Crossing Cottonwood Creek, they made our way up the slope of the Owl Creek Range. 

John “Josh” Deane came West looking for adventure — and got more than he bargained for when he took a job as a military dispatch rider. It was 150 years ago that he found himself carrying the first message about Custer’s last stand to Wyoming’s Fort Brown.  

Daily Darwin: Friday, October 27, 2023

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