A Gillette man accused of shooting arrows into his neighbor’s home, and admitting he hates her for playing loud music, faces up to 11 years in prison.
William W. Wright, who is 37 this year, was implicated Monday when his neighbor called Gillette Police Officer Ralph Valdez on his work cellphone to report that Wright was yelling and gesturing at her from his porch, according to an evidentiary affidavit filed in Gillette Circuit Court.
The woman does not speak English, so she narrated her story to Valdez in Spanish on Monday evening, the affidavit says.
It started with Wright yelling at her and “throwing her the middle finger,” Valdez wrote in the affidavit. The woman said she couldn’t tell what the neighbor was saying, but she knew he was upset.
Valdez counseled the woman to dial 911 to report a breach of peace, but just then an arrow hit the woman’s home, the affidavit says.
She said she was scared and wanted help. She reportedly peeked out her living room window, still on the phone with Valdez, and she saw a man standing on his deck in a green neon shirt, flipping her his middle finger.
The man then pointed a loaded bow at her, drew it and released it, hitting her home again with an arrow, the woman said.
Come Outside
Another woman whom the caller believed to be her neighbor’s wife and a younger female exited the neighbor man’s home and started arguing with him on the porch, says the affidavit.
In the meantime, Valdez and other officers were on their way to the neighborhood.
While en route, the woman reportedly told Valdez the neighbor man walked through his lawn to her property and pulled the arrows out of her home.
Multiple officers converged on the scene and found a man in a green neon shirt, whom they later identified by the contents of his wallet as William Wright.
The affidavit says Wright looked out his front door at officers, but ducked back into his home. An officer bellowed instructions through a loudspeaker for Wright to come outside.
Wobbly
Wright eventually walked out to the officers. He was off-balance, Valdez wrote.
Wright reportedly stopped in the trailer park’s parking area and tried to light a cigarette, but dropped it from his mouth when he brought a lighter to it and wobbled as he tried to retrieve the cigarette from the ground.
An officer kept asking Wright to walk forward.
The affidavit says Wright yelled and cursed at the officer instead, calling him a “mother f***er,” and kept ignoring commands to put his hands on his head.
Valdez and another officer planned to get behind Wright and detain him. Each grabbed one of Wright’s arms, but Wright lurched away, says the affidavit.
“I acted quickly by grabbing onto William’s torso to assist him to the ground in order to effectively detain William, who was becoming combative,” Valdez wrote.
Officers kept commanding Wright to put his hands behind his back, but he balled up his fists and clenched them into his chest, the affidavit says.
Ultimately four officers detained the man, handcuffed him, searched him for weapons and fished out his identification card, says the affidavit.
There's A Bow
The document says that during a protective sweep of Wright’s home, officers spotted an archery bow and arrows in plain sight on the living room couch and floor.
They also found holes “consistent to that of the tip of the arrows” in the neighbor woman’s home.
One officer told Valdez that Wright made statements that he hated his neighbor for playing music too loud.
In a portable breath test, Wright blew a 0.10 blood-alcohol reading, says the affidavit.
Wright reportedly denied coming out of the home with a bow and arrow, denied damaging his neighbor’s home and denied pointing a loaded bow at his neighbor.
Three-Count Ticket
Wright is charged with one felony, aggravated assault, which carries a penalty of up to 10 years in prison and $10,000 in fines. He also faces two misdemeanors, one for property destruction (up to six months and $750 in fines) and another for interfering with officers (up to one year and $1,000 in fines).
He is scheduled for a Nov. 14 preliminary hearing in Gillette Circuit Court.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
