Officer-Involved Shooting In Thermopolis After Baseball Bat Incident

UPDATE: Man Killed In Thermopolis Officer-Involved Shooting Identified

THERMOPOLIS — Eyewitnesses reported hearing around 10 shots Monday afternoon after police were called to conduct a welfare check on a man seen thrashing his home and surroundings with a baseball bat. Authorities have confirmed an officer-involved shooting happened.

“There was an officer/deputy-involved shooting on the 300 block of Clark Street,” says a Monday-evening statement by Hot Springs County Sheriff Jerimie Kraushaar. “There is no continued threat to the community. We are asking for prayers for everyone involved.”

The Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation was on scene Monday investigating.

Authorities have not confirmed whether there was a fatality from the incident.

With A Baseball Bat

The incident began when a man started thrashing and swinging a baseball bat while yelling in his backyard.

Kerry Wilson, a neighbor who shares a backyard fence line with the man, told Cowboy State Daily the neighbor man has shown concerning behavior before, such as peeping at her through the fence, pacing while screaming and yelling; getting into at least one fight with his dad and prompting intervention from another neighbor.

For five years, the man’s outbursts have been troubling, she said.

But this time the baseball bat added extra worries, she said.

“He was, like, swinging it around above his head, and around to the side, and he’d whack it on the ground really hard — whack the side of his house and, like, peek in to see if his dad was watching,” said Wilson. “I don’t know if maybe him and his dad were in some kind of altercation.”

One of Wilson’s daughters had asked to play outside that afternoon, but Wilson didn’t want her to witness “this little mental instability … happening.”

Another daughter could hear the man screaming and yelling from her downstairs bedroom, even with the windows shut, Wilson said.

Eventually, worried for her daughters, for the neighbor man’s dad and for the other neighbors — which include a church with a day care — Wilson called in the welfare check.

‘Drop The Bat’

A law-enforcement agent arrived.

Another neighbor, a man who declined to be identified by name, said the first agent on scene was from the Thermopolis Police Department . A second responder who was on scene by the time the shots sounded was a Hot Springs County Sheriff’s deputy, the man added.

“Drop the bat,” Wilson heard the police officer say, clearly, at least five times. By the third time, the agent also said “no-no-no-no-no, drop the bat.”

On the fourth time he said “No, drop the bat,” Wilson added.

Then Wilson heard metal or aluminum clunking, followed by the grunting and scuffling noises of a wrestling match, she said.

“Then I heard, ‘no-no-no-no,’ then I heard like five or six shots,” said Wilson. After a pause, another three or four shots sounded. Then another three from what sounded like a different weapon, she said.

Wilson still isn’t sure who fired first or who fired at all. She didn’t see the neighbor man with a gun at any point, but she couldn’t rule out the possibility of his having gotten one, she said.

Wilson believed the neighbor man had died but she did not witness his death or see him dead herself. That came secondhand from another neighbor, she said.

A Chase

The anonymous male neighbor saw more of the events than Wilson did, according to his account given to Cowboy State Daily on scene Monday night.

He said the man with the baseball bat was chasing the Thermopolis Police Department officer while the latter was still in his car. While trying to get into the officer’s car, the man even got the officer’s door open a couple times, said the witness.

“Lock your door, man,” the witness couldn’t help thinking to himself. The man kept chasing the officer, and the officer “did his tactical moves — even hit the guy with the car,” said the witness.

That was when the sheriff’s deputy arrived, he added.

The action went behind the houses in the area, and the witness lost sight of it. He heard an agent tell the man to put the bat down. Then he heard two taser blasts, followed by the gunshots, he said.

Keep Reminding

Wilson became emotional Monday evening, saying she was dealing with some guilt for calling in the welfare check that ended so tragically.

“But I keep reminding myself that the officer told him to drop the bat at least five times — and several minutes before the shots,” she said. “I’m just sad that he took the difficult way.”

Wilson’s friend Julie Robertson was at her house for dinner Monday night, offering moral support.

“That’s where the guy was swinging the bat and freaking out and yelling,” said Robertson, gesturing toward the man’s abutting backyard. “Obviously, (Wilson) has children. It’s that close. To me, that’s too close.”

Both women said Monday’s shooting, plus another vandalism shooting Robertson said happened in her neighborhood Sunday morning — and an officer-involved shooting that happened in the town about 18 months ago — all don’t add up to the version of Thermopolis that they know.

“So, something’s going on,” said Robertson.

Contact Clair McFarland at clair@cowboystatedaily.com

Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.