It’s time to take a look at what’s happening around Wyoming, for Thursday August 15th. I’m Wendy Corr, bringing you headlines from the Cowboy State Daily newsroom - brought to you by Outrider PAC. According to a new survey, 79% of Wyoming Voters support Freedom in Education. Learn more about Educational Savings Accounts in Wyoming at OutriderPAC.com
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The numbers are out for Wyoming’s 2024 state legislative primary campaigns, and primary candidates have raised and spent big money this election season.
Cowboy State Daily’s Leo Wolfson reports that even though the primary season is not complete, legislative candidates are still reporting larger financial totals on average than what was reported for the 2022 primary election season.
“The real big story that I think a lot of people are going to latch onto is that Governor Mark Gordon was extremely busy. You know, as far as what candidates he gave to during the election season. For one, his prosperity and commerce PAC brought in nearly $300,000 of which the governor donated $150,000 himself.”
Candidates and political action committees had until the end of day Tuesday to submit their campaign finance reports.
Read the full story HERE.
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Forest rangers and the public used to settle disputes over a cup of coffee, but a recent incident in which an armed agent in tactical gear confronted a ranch family could indicate those days are over,.
Some retired rangers told outdoors reporter Mark Heinz that the situation involving Charles and Heather Maude of South Dakota, who were visited by Forest Service personnel in tactical gear over a dispute regarding an apparently murky fence line between their land and Forest Service property, has garnered scrutiny from around the country.
“This is something where the Ranger just might have called ahead and gone to the couple's house and sat down with a cup of coffee and try to resolve whatever the issue was. But also from from the perspective of the agencies, things have also changed, like the public has also changed. The situation in South Dakota does seem to have bad optics for the Forest Service and for that Ranger District.”
The fence in question has been in place for about 75 years on the legacy family ranch.
Read the full story HERE.
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One of the most unusual houses in Sheridan, Wyoming, area has just hit the market.
Kendall and Joseph Hartman are selling the Lion Dog Estate, their dream “mountain-prairie zen” home designed in 2005 by renowned architectural firm Fourth Street Design Studio.
The 7,577-square-foot home, which includes five bedrooms, four full baths and one half-bath on 2.79 acres, is listing for $4.5 million - but as Renee Jean reports, those bathrooms are part of the house’s unique appeal.
“It's got lots of features, but if I were going to pick one to highlight, it would have to be the waterfall bubble tub. So I'm told by the owner, if you close your eyes, you'll feel just like you're sitting in a babbling brook, albeit one with nice, warm, heated water. Then the other feature to this bubble tub is as the water is cascading into the larger outer shell and then filling the smaller inner shell. It's changing colors.”
The home also has a built-in sound system, a built-in cappuccino machine and bamboo floors throughout. There’s a library, four outdoor entertainment areas, a pond, and a spacious four-car garage with heated floors.
Read the full story HERE.
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Emotions tend to run a little hot during election season, but an anonymous caller to Secretary of State Chuck Gray’s office crossed the line from emotional to possibly criminal when he left a vulgar, threatening voicemail for Gray.
The sinister voicemail sounds like a thinly veiled threat on Gray’s life if he doesn’t conduct a fair election, according to politics reporter Leo Wolfson.
“There’s a man who, kind of, in a rather menacing voice, threatened Secretary Gray that he better not cheat in the upcoming election or do anything to mess with the results or not him, but somebody like him will be coming after him… Politicians in Wyoming have certainly received threats before, death threats even. But it is somewhat notable considering the timing and the fact that Gray is the number two elected official in the state.”
Gray said the voicemail has been turned over to law enforcement.
Read the full story HERE.
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The South Dakota husband and wife who shot at and bear-sprayed a Colorado woman who walked through their campsite in the Bridger-Teton National Forest in June are asking a judge to dismiss their case, claiming they acted in self-defense.
But Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports that woman whom the pair admittedly attacked told police that she was only out looking for a custom-made cowboy hat that blew off her head during a horseback ride earlier that day.
“If you have a self defense claim, it doesn't necessarily have to go all the way to a jury. You can have an early hearing before a judge, called it John's hearing, where you get the chance to prove, at first glance, that you acted in accordance with Wyoming self defense laws. The prosecutor then has to argue by a higher evidentiary standard that you didn't. And so if the prosecutor doesn't meet his standard, but you meet yours, you go free. So there's one of these. John's hearing scheduled in the DeWitt case, August 20.”
The prosecutor’s filing calls the Dewitts the initial aggressors. If he can prove that claim to the court, then the Dewitts can’t claim self-defense.
Read the full story HERE.
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A black bear crawled inside a tent and attacked a 3-year-old girl late Sunday at a private campground south of Red Lodge, Montana, near Yellowstone National Park.
Cowboy State Daily’s Mark Heinz reports that Madison Findley-Dickson was released from a Billings hospital Tuesday, but still faces a long recovery from her injuries.
“What wildlife officials are saying is that the bear was, it was a young female, a sub adult female black bear was probably drawn in by loose food, flavored drinks. In other words, attractants that were left kind of laying open around around the campground, kind of drew the bear in, and then the bear subsequently ended up attacking this girl in her tent, and they did track the bear down and kill it the next day, it didn't end well for either the girl or the bear.”
Wyoming Game and Fish personnel helped in a search for and capture of the bear, a subadult female, which was caught and killed by wildlife officials the day after the attack.
Read the full story HERE.
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Goshen County authorities are looking for a 26-year-old Torrington man accused of disfiguring his girlfriend by pistol-whipping her and kicking her chest so hard she had to be intubated.
Andrew Atkinson is on the run after brutally beating the woman, who was also attempting to care for their child during the incident, according to Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland.
“She reportedly had a collapsed lung. Her face appeared disfigured. She had two black eyes, swollen shut. Her entire body, including her feet, was bruised or cut, and she needed stitches and sutures on her head due to what court documents call a pistol whip.”
Atkinson had not been caught as of Wednesday, after a warrant for his arrest was filed Monday.
Read the full story HERE.
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The donation of a $1.5 million Pony Express collection could jump-start a multimillion-dollar project that would make the Fort Caspar Museum a national draw for fans of the famously brief 18-month Western mail service.
Cowboy State Daily’s Dale Killingbeck reports that the Casper City Council on Tuesday gave a thumbs up to accept the donation from the late Joe Nardone, a California collector who wanted his collection of Pony Express history, art and archives to find a historically appropriate home.
“The Casper City Council has accepted a donation from a late collector of Pony Express artifacts. It's worth about $1.5 million and that means that in the future, Casper could become like the mecca for people that want to research or or check out the Pony Express and what it meant to the country.”
The collection includes items relating to Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show, an extensive archive of original documents, maps, bronze sculptures, and historic materials from the National Pony Express Association, among other one-of-a-kind items relating to the expansion of the telegraph.
Read the full story HERE.
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One person was shot Wednesday on Wyoming’s Wind River Indian Reservation.
The FBI has confirmed that the shooting happened in the town of Ethete around midday. Around that time, the nearby Wyoming Indian schools system went into lockdown mode for about an hour, the school confirmed to Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland.
“A person sustained an abdominal, abdominal gunshot, according to the scanner traffic, the FBI was a little terse, acknowledging that there had been a be it on the lookout alert and that no one was arrested. Scanner traffic painted a more colorful story, with agents talking about visually tracking a man who was getting away, who was tough to follow, and then later on, a vehicle fleeing Wyoming.”
The FBI is coordinating with the Wind River Police Department, which is the reservation’s law-enforcement outpost for the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs, and with other law enforcement agencies.
Read the full story HERE.
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With cameras in smartphones, GoPros and on drones everywhere, it seems that Wyoming’s wildlife is effectively being adored to death.
At times, Wyoming’s famous grizzlies and other wild celebrities seem to have more paparazzi following them around than if they were walking down Hollywood Boulevard - and wildlife experts told outdoors reporter Mark Heinz that’s not necessarily good for the wildlife.
“everybody's got a camera on their cell phone now, and they want to walk up within two feet of whatever animal it is to get a better shot than the next person does. We're seeing more and more, for lack of a better term, just simply ridiculous behavior on the part of some of these amateurs, people trying to get close up photos of wildlife with their cell phones, or again, even doing illegal things like chasing animals around with drones.”
In general, Game and Fish doesn’t have a “hard and fast rule” regarding the wildlife photography ethics, she said. But the agency advises people to keep their distance and otherwise avoid stressing animals, because it can kill them.
Read the full story HERE.
