The 18-year-old student who turned himself in Tuesday on claims he threatened to shoot up Cheyenne’s East High School had made a paper gun, but did not appear to have a real gun on campus, court documents say.
The student is now out of jail on a $2,000 bond, court documents indicate. His preliminary hearing is set for Oct. 11 in Cheyenne Circuit Court.
Tyler Bathke was arrested on campus Sept. 26, after law enforcement agents set up a perimeter around the school, placed the school in lockdown and spoke with Bathke in the overflow student parking lot, says an evidentiary affidavit filed in the case.
Cheyenne Police Department School Resource Officer Mike Fernandez was just finishing up an investigation into a physical fight between two students at about 1:16 that afternoon when a girl, who is about 16 years old, approached him, Fernandez wrote in the affidavit.
In her last class, a male whose name she didn’t know said he had a gun and lifted his shirt to reveal that he did have a gun in his waistband, the girl told Fernandez.
He said he was going out to get some bullets and warned her not to come back into the school because a school shooting was going to happen, the affidavit relates.
The girl also told Fernandez that the male said a school shooting would happen near homecoming — the document doesn’t specify whether this meant the game or the dance — and warned her not to go, Fernandez wrote.
Fernandez placed the school into a secure perimeter at about 1:20 p.m. The girl indicated the male student had left the school via a west exit door near the swimming pool, says the document.
Agents placed the school into lockdown mode, and the suspect was identified as Bathke. The affidavit doesn’t say how investigators made that connection.
Officers contacted Bathke in the overflow parking area at about 1:34 p.m. He appeared cooperative, Fernandez wrote.
The affidavit says Bathke told officers he made a paper gun the day before and it was in his Chevy Tahoe, which he allowed officers to search. They did find a white paper gun in the center console. They also called his mother, who was out of town, the document adds.
Bathke's father, whom Cowboy State Daily reached by phone Thursday, declined to comment.
The affidavit says Bathke confirmed to investigators that he’d spoken in class about a prior school-shooting threat by someone else. He said he talked about homecoming, and what an easy target it would be for a mass shooter, reportedly.
Bathke admitted to showing his friends the paper gun and holding it in a shooting position, Fernandez wrote.
He “was just joking around,” he told police, adding that he jokes that way frequently, according to the document.
The affidavit says that at one point Bathke confirmed that he’d told the girl not to come back to school because he was going to shoot it up, and at a later point he denied making the threat.
At The Time …
When gossip of the alleged threat first circulated last week, someone posted a false social media announcement saying a student had been shot in the school’s parking lot.
The post triggered some parents into a frenzy of fear and worry.
Cheyenne Police Department spokesperson Alexandra Farkas said at the time that agents determined “there was no threat to the school.”
Though Bathke was in handcuffs and read his Miranda rights at the time the threat was made, he apparently not taken to the jail that day.
Officers applied for an arrest warrant the next day, and Bathke turned himself in Tuesday, according to a statement Cheyenne Police Department dispatched Thursday.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
