You Still Here

[{"type":"text","text":"Christmas decorations gone wrong...."}]

Herald 12 25 24

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

<title>Hark The Herald: Wednesday, December 25, 2024 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Christmas decorations gone wrong....

Hark The Herald: Wednesday, December 25, 2024

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

Clair McFarland

Crime & Courts

Two people died Wednesday after a two-vehicle crash unfolded in front of Riverton’s Walmart, drawing passersby from both sides of the city’s busiest road, North Federal Boulevard.

[{"type":"text","text":"The crash was reported around 8:15 p.m."}]

A white Dodge pickup with a crunched hood sat on its side in the middle of the road, while the mangled remains of what witnesses said had been a black Jeep sat upright nearly a half-block south of the pickup, on the northbound lane of the road.

Police, emergency medical personnel and the Riverton Volunteer Fire Department converged. People on the scene pulled one man out of the pickup. The man was bleeding.

“I asked him what the year was,” said Trent Hallada, who was walking in the area and felt debris, “possibly” hit his eye when the crash happened. “He couldn’t even say the date and year.”

Two more eyewitnesses, who both declined to be identified by name, said the driver of the pickup sat on the ground while personnel responded, but when the response calmed slightly, he tried to run.

Law enforcement officers tackled him and took him into custody, the two witnesses said.

The Fremont County Coroner’s office also responded with a transport truck. One person, who lay in the middle of the road under a tarp and closer to the black vehicle, was placed into the transport truck. Firefighters held red tarps around the person to shield public view.

The Riverton Police Department announced in a Thursday statement that “both occupants of one of the vehicles had serious injuries;” one was pronounced dead one the scene, and the second was taken to SageWest Health Care, “where they succumbed to their injuries.”

The RPD statement doesn’t describe the two different vehicles, calling them “one of the vehicles” and “the other vehicle.” But the statement, coupled with witness interviews, indicates that two people were in the black vehicle, and have both now died.

And the driver of the pickup was arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence and vehicular homicide, plus other related offenses, the statement indicates when coupled with witness interviews.

RPD concluded its statement with a request for anyone with information on the wreck to call 307-856-4891.

Riverton crash 6 18 26

<title>Two Dead, One Tackled And Arrested in Riverton Crash | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Two people died Wednesday evening after a two-vehicle crash unfolded in front of Riverton’s Walmart. Law enforcement officers tackled a suspect who was arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence and vehicular homicide.

Two Dead, One Tackled And Arrested in Riverton Crash

Mac Watson

Daily Video News

It’s time to take a look at what’s happening around Wyoming for Thursday, June 18th.  I’m Mac Watson

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

The Carbon County sheriff says the man who shot a deputy in Baggs last week was likely planning a ‘large scale act.’ Cowboy State Daily’s Greg Johnson reports that the sheriff described the gunman having a stockpile of ammunition.

“The sheriff said that hundreds of magazines for an AR 15 were found in his apartment. It seemed like he was preparing. He also added that he set his apartment on fire before he left and went on his other high speed chase that ultimately ended in him being shot by law enforcement, and inside were several, a number of propane tanks that would have really made that an explosive improvised explosive device.”

The identity of the suspect isn’t being released pending the completion of an investigation by the Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation, Sheriff Bakken tells Cowboy State Daily.

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

A semitruck carrying millions of honeybees flipped over on U.S. Highway 191 in Yellowstone National Park on Tuesday. Cowboy State Daily’s Andrew Rossi spoke with Cheyenne beekeeper Michael Jordan who calls the scene “a devastating loss.”

“A semi truck carrying dozens of beehives, which would account for many millions of bees, flipped over on the road going through Yellowstone National Park near the west entrance. So, obviously, we don't have a lot of information on exactly what happened, but I spoke to Michael Jordan, a beekeeper in Cheyenne, who's dealt with similar situations. and he said that it looked like only 50% of what was there was recoverable, maybe, and they have 48 hours to get on the scene and get new bee hives or honey boxes at the site, so the bees have a place to go, because if they take longer than 48 hours, the queen bees are going to migrate to a spot where they feel safe, and they're going to take their entire retinue with them.”

According to Jordan, an average honey box can hold between 75,000 and 125,000 bees. Each box costs around $500 and generates $2,000 in profit from honey production. 

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"},{"type":"italic"}],"text":"–  "}]

Hoskinson Health & Wellness in Gillette, which envisioned itself as the "Mayo Clinic of the West" before announcing last month it would close, may have a buyer. Cowboy State Daily’s Renee Jean reports that the Hoskinson family announced Wednesday it's in talks to sell to a large hospital chain.

“This clinic, they had a worthy aim, they wanted to be the Mayo Clinic of the West. They wanted to bring cutting-edge, advanced medical care to rural America. They were going to start in Gillette, figure out a business model there, and then translate that to other rural communities. Unfortunately, you know, the healthcare business is brutal, as they, as they discovered, and I don't think these factors were new, necessarily, maybe new to the hot to Charles Hoskinson, who bankrolled this. there are just all kinds of issues with how the healthcare system works, and ultimately he found it was not workable.”

The sale could happen quickly, with an eye on maintaining continuity of patient care. Hoskinson Health announced in May that it would 

, citing months of multi-million-dollar financial losses. 

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"},{"type":"italic"}],"text":"–"}]

After Wyoming lawmakers grappled with the topic of UFOs last year, the Pentagon released a report of five U.S. Army service members who said they observed a giant translucent airborne potato-shaped UFO over the Cheyenne Mountains in 2022. Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports a young man and his dad saw an eerily similar object described in the report 35 years ago in Wyoming.

“So, Rich Barrett, who's an attorney in Wyoming, Dad was a federal judge. He had a sighting of a strange device like 35 years ago with his dad that they corroborated one with the other, so he said that the sighting of a strange potato-shaped flying object over Colorado Springs by five US Army soldiers three years ago, four years ago. He said, look, I don't expect answers for what me and my dad saw 35 years ago. but he did say it's hope inspiring that the Trump administration is trying for transparency.”

Now the government calls them unidentified anomalous phenomenon (UAP) as the modern term for UFO. Five U.S. Army service members observed a translucent, milky, shimmering, airborne object over the Cheyenne Mountains in February 2022, says the report.

I’ll have more news from Cowboy State Daily right after this.

Cowboy State Daily News continues now….

Drought and demand are pushing beef to record high prices, leaving Wyoming ranchers praying for rain even if Americans are willing to pay more. Cowboy State Daily’s Kate Meadows reports that ranchers have some tough decisions to make.

“The USDA is reporting that beef prices are high now, and they're expected to go even higher in 2027 because of a historic beef shortage. The cattle shortage is due to a number of factors. Todd Formstrom is a rancher and the president of Wyoming Farm Bureau, he told me that the decision he's making right now is when he's at an all-time high of selling calves, does he sell now and reinvest that money into his operation, or does he hold on to his calves? And he said ranchers are making those tough decisions across Wyoming.”

 While the situation looks bleak now, Wyoming ranchers are optimistic — confident that herds will be rebuilt eventually and that, one of these days, it will rain.

Residents are split over the proposed massive Prometheus Hyperscale data center, which Uinta County commissioners gave a green light on Tuesday. Cowboy State daily’s Renee Jean reports that one critic says, “Prometheus promises all of these things ... and we end up holding the bag.”

“They view a lot of these promises by companies as, you know, suspect. one of the people who spoke against, who's circulating a petition there, he mentioned how many times he's seen, you know, promises broken by various companies along the way. Prometheus hasn't asked for anything, they haven't asked anybody to rehab a space for them. They're not asking for any taxpayer funded grants or anything like that. There's no public money involved at all. It's all private equity.”

In a packed meeting house, public comments ran roughly 50-50 for and against the project. 

Opponents say the proposed 972-megawatt power project at Seminoe Reservoir in Carbon County threatens the state's most prized bighorn sheep herd and the "Miracle Mile" section of the North Platte River famed for its blue-ribbon trout fishing. Cowboy State Daily’s Mark Heinz reports that all eyes are on the BLM and a new study by the Federal Energy Regulation commission.

“The Federal Energy Regulation Commission just put out their environmental impact statement and recommended approving that project, recommending issuing a license. Now it still has several steps it’s going to have to go through. We don't know how the BLM is going to respond, because the BLM is actually being asked to waive some protections from wildlife that would pertain to the construction schedule. In other words, you can't do construction while the big bighorn sheep are on their wintering range, which is right next to the construction site. So, either the construction would have to be seasonal. The company says that would make the project just too darned expensive.”

In addition to concerns over bighorn sheep, opponents say they worry how the project could affect blue-ribbon trout fishing on the North Platte River’s Miracle Mile Section, and municipal water supplies.

The Hot Springs County GOP rejected a party leader's bid Monday to nearly drain its bank account and send $4,000 to the state party. Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports that five people on the losing side of the question walked out, leaving not enough voters to pay their bills.  

“Cheryl Aguiar told me that she and others did not want the new iteration of the county party to have that money, since some among them had backed a conflicting fundraising event, in her words, ‘sabotage’ the party's fundraising event. She said that, though, the walkout was kind of incidental, that she didn't mean for she didn't coordinate for everyone to walk out at once. The critics of the move dispute that, saying no, this walkout looked coordinated, and also the Charlie Kirk Memorial dinner only raised about $1,500 So, what's the rationale of sending 4000 to the state party.”

Delegate Aguiar said that for her part, she left the meeting Monday because the chair was letting attendees heckle and berate her – a claim Chair Joe Martinez disputes.

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

And that’s today’s news. Get your free digital subscription to Wyoming's only statewide newspaper by hitting the Daily Newsletter button on 

 - and you can watch this newscast every day by clicking Subscribe on our 

 channel, or listen to us on your favorite podcast app.  Thanks for watching - I’m Mac Watson, for Cowboy State Daily.

News image 6 18 26

<title>Cowboy State Daily Video Newscast: Thursday, June 18, 2026 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Thursday's headlines include:
* Baggs Suspect Planned Large-Scale Attack
* Gillette Hoskinson Clinic Says It Has A Buyer
* Truck Overturns With Millions Of Bees In Yellowstone

Cowboy State Daily Video Newscast: Thursday, June 18, 2026

Coy Knobel

Don Day Weather

Sunny in Wyoming on Thursday. Partly to mostly cloudy overnight, mostly clear over the Eastern Plains. Highs in the 70s and 80s. Lows mainly in the 40s and low 50s.

Sunny today with a high near 83 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph. Partly cloudy and breezy overnight with a low near 49 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph. 

Sunny today with a high near 86 and increasing clouds overnight with a low near 51 and wind gusts as high as 22 mph.

 Sunny today with a high near 85 and partly cloudy overnight with a low near 52 and wind gusts as high as 22 mph.

 Sunny today with a high near 80 and partly cloudy overnight with a low near 45.

  Sunny and breezy today with a high near 86 and wind gusts as high as 28 mph. Partly cloudy and breezy overnight with a low near 49 and wind gusts as high as 26 mph.

Sunny today with a high near 78 and wind gusts as high as 22 mph. Partly cloudy overnight with a low near 40 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph. 

Sunny and breezy today with a high near 77 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph. Breezy, gradually becoming partly cloudy overnight with a low near 40 and wind gusts as high as 24 mph.

 Sunny today with a high near 81 and gradually clearing late overnight with a low near 44.

  Sunny and breezy today with a high near 79 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph. Mostly cloudy and breezy overnight with a low near 39 and wind gusts as high as 24 mph.

 Sunny and breezy today with a high near 75 and wind gusts as high as 32 mph. Increasing clouds and breezy overnight with a low near 42 and wind gusts as high as 30 mph.

  Sunny today with a high near 79 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph. Mostly cloudy overnight with a low near 43.

Old Faithful in Yellowstone National Park

:  Sunny today with a high near 71 and wind gusts as high as 21 mph. Increasing clouds overnight with a low near 38 and wind gusts as high as 21 mph.

Sunny today with a high near 83 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph. Increasing clouds overnight with a low near 51 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph.

:  Sunny today with a high near 78 and wind gusts as high as 21 mph. Partly cloudy overnight with a low near 49 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph. 

  Sunny today with a high near 81 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph. Partly cloudy overnight with a low near 50 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph.

  Gradually becoming sunny today with a high near 72 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph. Partly cloudy overnight with a low near 48 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph.

  Mostly sunny today with a high near 75 and partly cloudy overnight with a low near 44.

:  Mostly sunny today with a high near 75 and mostly cloudy overnight with a low near 46.

Mostly sunny today with a high near 74 and wind gusts as high as 21 mph. Partly cloudy overnight with a slight chance of rain after midnight, a low near 46 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph. 

  Mostly sunny today with a high near 73 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph. Partly cloudy overnight with a slight chance of rain after midnight, a low near 50 and wind gusts as high as 17 mph.

:  Mostly sunny today with a high near 75 and wind gusts as high as 18 mph. Partly cloudy overnight with a slight chance of rain after midnight, a low near 46 and wind gusts as high as 17 mph.

  Sunny today with a high near 85 and mostly clear overnight with a low near 55. 

  Mostly sunny today with a high near 77 and mostly clear overnight with a low near 46. 

  Sunny and breezy today with a high near 79 and wind gusts as high as 22 mph. Mostly clear and breezy overnight with a low near 45 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph.

  Sunny today with a high near 82 and increasing clouds and breezy overnight with a low near 50 and wind from 15-20 mph after midnight. 

  Sunny today with a high near 80 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph. Increasing clouds overnight with a low near 46.

  Sunny today with a high near 81 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph. Increasing clouds overnight with a low near 43.

  Sunny and breezy today with a high near 81 and wind gusts as high as 30 mph. Increasing clouds overnight with a low near 48 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph.

  Sunny and breezy today with a high near 83 and wind gusts as high as 30 mph. Increasing clouds overnight with a low near 46.

  Sunny and breezy today with a high near 79 and wind gusts as high as 30 mph. Increasing clouds and breezy overnight with a low near 45 and wind gusts as high as 30 mph.

Daycap large no play 6 18 26

<title>Don Day's Wyoming Weather Forecast: Thursday, June 18, 2026 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Don Day's Wyoming Weather Forecast: Thursday, June 18, 2026

Government & Politics

Politics

 In Hot Springs County, the divide in Wyoming’s active Republican political base is actually a chasm.

That breach usually falls between the GOP faction more aligned with the Wyoming Freedom Caucus and the faction that tends to oppose it.  

It resurfaced Monday night at the Hot Springs County Republican Central Committee meeting, where precinct committee people and their elected officers gathered to handle regular business.

 delegate, Cheryl Aguiar, made a motion to nearly drain the party’s checking account by sending $4,000 to the Wyoming Republican Party. She didn’t explain the motion to committee leaders at the time.

Her motion failed on a 6-6 tie vote, after which five people, including Aguiar, left the meeting.

People on both sides of the controversy told Cowboy State Daily the voters’ departure left the party short of a quorum and unable to pay its other bills, including to local businesses.

Aguiar said in a Wednesday interview that she made the motion at the request of a large group to protest some members’ efforts last month to “sabotage” the party’s fundraiser dinner by hosting an alternate event on the same night, May 29.

“They literally tried to sabotage – to steal money from our yearly fundraiser; to hold an alternate event to punish the state (party),” Aguiar said. “Why come and punish the county if you’re mad at something the state (party) did?”

Aguiar said that for her part, she left the meeting Monday because the chair was letting attendees heckle and berate her – a claim Chair Joe Martinez disputes.

Multiple critics of Aguiar’s move countered in Tuesday and Wednesday interviews, calling the members’ departure childish.

“I think it’s pretty crappy to walk out on paying the bills for the (gala) that they all held,” precinct committeewoman Shurie Scheel said. “It’s one thing to be mad about it. It’s another to screw over the caterer.”

The party also owes other small businesses money, including the local newspaper, the Independent Record, for advertising, she said.

Scheel said she’s unsure if the local party will have a quorum again before new precinct committee people are sworn in next January, as it’s uncertain if the walkouts – whom she cast as sympathetic to the Wyoming Freedom Caucus wing of the GOP – will return to vote.

Scheel said she and her husband might have to pay the catering business, We Got Your 6 Catering, in the meantime.

[{"type":"text","text":"A Court Case, Two Galas"}]

 Martinez as the local party chair and Scheel’s husband, Phil Scheel, as state committeeman. The judge ruled May 29 that the other people who’d been serving as chair and state committeeman for the past 15 months – Bradyn Harvey and Russell Lewis – were elected in a manner that violated state law.

Monday’s gathering was also the first meeting after the battle of two galas.

The Hot Springs County GOP planned a Charlie Kirk memorial fundraiser dinner for May 29.

Scheel had been organizing the dinner. But she quit planning it to support an alternate “Take Back Wyoming” dinner set for the same evening.

Scheel told Cowboy State Daily she backed the alternate dinner to protest the state Republican Party’s new bylaw declaring a right to donate to or endorse some Republicans over others during the primary election cycle.

State law forbids the GOP and any other major party from taking sides among its own candidates in the primary election. The party is free to back Republicans against Democratic candidates and others in the general election, however. The state party is suing Wyoming over the primary backing ban right now, saying the statute violates the group’s First Amendment rights.  

“Take Back Wyoming: Non-Freedom Caucus Republican Candidates Shop Party,” the banner for the alternate May 29 gala says. “Supporting fair primaries and grassroots conservative values.”

Scheel told Cowboy State Daily she disagrees with the state party’s mission to overturn the state law because primary election day is “the day the voters of the Republican party choose their candidates. The party shouldn’t be choosing the candidates. The voters should.”

: “It shouldn’t be a room full of party insiders who decide who the Republican Party nominee will be, and then tell the voters who to choose. And, the more I thought about it, the more pissed off I got about it.”  

[{"type":"text","text":"So We Carried On"}]

In Aguiar’s telling, Scheel and others answered a state party maneuver with “retaliation” against the county party.

Aguiar said as one voter she doesn’t like the idea of the state party sending money to candidates pre-primary either, though she thinks the party should be able to endorse candidates during that phase.

[{"type":"text","text":"For her, that’s beside the point."}]

“We had to spend – I think there were three of us that spent three solid days calling candidates” to arrange the party, Aguiar said. “We did a good job.”

 U.S. House candidate Steve Friess and Secretary of State Candidate Rachel Williams (also known as state Rep. Rachel Rodriguez-Williams) attended the GOP dinner.

 included a $1,900 bill to the caterer, $146 in advertising and other costs totaling about $2,904.

Martinez attended the Charlie Kirk dinner, which Aguiar said is to his credit. Other than the alleged heckling incident, Aguiar also spoke favorably of Martinez as party chair.

Aguiar said her husband had also run a profitable gun raffle for the party. 

Aguiar concluded that Scheel and the others involved in planning the alternate, protest dinner “don’t care.”

“These people do not care about the Hot Springs County Republican Party,” Aguiar said.

But after the judge’s order – filed the same evening as both dinners – the party leadership changed, and the party tilted toward the group not aligned with the more populist Wyoming Freedom Caucus.

“And for them to get the money that we raised, despite their sabotaging of the alternate event … I did not think it would be in good hands,” Aguiar said.

Aguiar said she and her husband, Bob Aguiar – who is also a Hot Springs County commissioner – left together, and Pam Phillips, to whom they’d given a ride, walked out as well.

She called it incidental that two more committee members, Michele Stevens and Russell Lewis, left the meeting at that time.

[{"type":"text","text":"The ‘Walkout’"}]

Aguiar was adamant that she didn’t make her motion to drain the account because of the judge’s order; she made it on behalf of a bigger group because of the dueling gala incident.

[{"type":"text","text":"Martinez doubts that, he said Wednesday."}]

The Charlie Kirk dinner raised less than $1,500 after expenses, while Aguiar moved to shift $4,000 from the local party’s account to its statewide counterpart.

“I mean, if it was specifically (because of) the Charlie Kirk dinner then that dollar amount should have been consistent with the actual profit,” Martinez said.

Martinez said he doesn’t believe anyone was heckling or verbally abusing Aguiar at the meeting, though the conversation grew “emotional.”

“It was an emotional item,” he recalled. “People wanted to know what the reasons for sending that money to the state were.”

Stevens in a post-publication comment pointed to her family's long battle against "threats and litigation" in the county. The Stevens family has tried for years to operate its tipi camping retreat and met with resistance from neighbors, a former iteration of the Hot Springs County commission, and the courts system. 

Stevens agrees with Aguiar that Martinez failed to maintain decorum, she said. 

"Monday night, when Chairman Joe Martinez let an agitated, packed room shout down Cheryl Aguiar’s motion to send part of the Charlie Kirk dinner proceeds to the state GOP, I didn’t feel safe staying in that room," said Stevens, adding that she believed the bills could still be paid. 

Stevens also criticized Shurie Scheel's change of course on the Charlie Kirk dinner, and Scheel's backing of a competing event. 

"It shouldn’t be overlooked that the Scheels have been at the center of the three most divisive legal fights this county has seen recently," said Stevens, adding allegations against Phil Scheel that have not been charged. 

"I didn’t walk out to dodge the bills," said Stevens. "I called Joe Martinez that same night and offered to reconvene to get every bill paid as soon as possible, and told him directly that walking out had nothing to do with the lawsuit. My only condition is the one I’d ask of any meeting: real order, and a room where people feel safe. I’m told the others plan to come back too."

Lewis told Cowboy State Daily on Wednesday that the walkout wasn't coordinated. He said he walked out because of the dueling galas incident - not because of the court's order that removed him from leadership. 

Sherman Skelton, a school board member who attended the meeting as a spectator, said the walkout seemed coordinated.

“I felt very much like those people (should be) there to represent me, our precinct. Not their personal agendas,” said Skelton said. "And it was probably one of the most childish things I’d ever seen in my life."

Shurie Scheel said the walkout appeared “staged," that Aguiar said, "OK, let's go everyone," and they all rose in unison and left. Scheel said that Aguiar acknowledged on her way out that the committee wouldn't have a quorum after they all left.

Aguiar for her part said party members in Scheel's camp merely have "Aguiar derangement syndrome" and that Shurie Scheel is unhappy that Aguiar's husband defeated Shurie's husband in the last County Commission race. 

This Story has been updated to include a post-publication comment by Michele Stevens

Charlie kirk dinner via RRW political facebook page 6 17 26

<title>Hot Springs County GOP Members Walk Out After Failed Vote To Drain Account | Cowboy State Daily</title>

The Hot Springs County GOP rejected a party leader's bid Monday to nearly drain its bank account and send $4,000 to the state party. Then five people on the losing side of the question walked out, leaving not enough voters to pay their bills.
 

Hot Springs County GOP Members Walk Out After Failed Vote To Drain Account

Kolby fedore

Kolby Fedore

Courts

A 12-person Laramie County jury found former South Cheyenne Water and Sewer District General Manager Dena Hansen guilty Wednesday of stealing about $350,000 from the district over nearly a decade.

A Laramie County District Court clerk confirmed Hansen's conviction on a single felony theft count. The verdict form was not publicly available Wednesday afternoon.

The case centered on allegations that about $350,000 was diverted from the South Cheyenne Water and Sewer District between 2014 and 2024 while Hansen oversaw its finances.

For years, the amounts were small enough to disappear into a stack of utility bills.

[{"type":"text","text":"A few hundred dollars one month. A little more the next."}]

Some was cash handed across a counter by customers paying water bills. Checks sometimes sat for days before clearing. Deposit slips appeared to tell different stories, depending on which copy investigators examined.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"A Familiar Face"}]

According to court records, Hansen worked for the district for more than 30 years.

Employees told investigators she was deeply involved in the district's day-to-day financial operations.

She handled deposits, interacted with customers, and maintained broad control over money moving through the office, says an affidavit of probable cause. 

The district serves customers south of Cheyenne, collecting monthly payments from residents and businesses for water and sewer service.

Those payments arrived in different forms — checks, cash and money orders — and for years appeared to move through the office without raising significant alarms.

After concerns arose about district finances in 2024, the South Cheyenne Water and Sewer District hired forensic accounting firm Jacobson and Associates to review years of records.

That review ultimately identified what investigators alleged were hundreds of thousands of dollars in missing funds.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Two Deposit Slips"}]

[{"type":"text","text":"One of the recurring details in the affidavit involved deposit slips."}]

Investigators alleged Hansen prepared bank deposits using duplicate deposit forms.

The yellow copies retained by the district frequently showed larger amounts than the white copies submitted to the bank -- a discrepancy that became a focus of the investigation.

In one section of the affidavit, investigators wrote that deposit slips appeared to have been altered using correction fluid before being delivered to the bank.

The records described instances where the amount recorded on the district's copy did not match the amount ultimately deposited.

Investigators concluded cash had been removed from deposits before they reached district accounts.

The affidavit further alleged that checks were sometimes substituted for missing cash to make deposit totals appear balanced.

Employees told investigators the district did not begin accepting online payments until October 2021.

According to witness statements summarized in the affidavit, Hansen opposed implementing online payment options.

Several employees reportedly told investigators they never understood why online payments were resisted.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Customers Complaints"}]

The investigation also uncovered complaints from customers who noticed something unusual.

Some customers contacted the district wondering why their checks had not cleared their bank accounts.

Investigators said those reports suggested certain checks were being held before being deposited, notes the affidavit. 

A Laramie County jury on Wednesday found the former manager of the South Cheyenne Water and Sewer District guilty of stealing about $350,000 from district accounts over a decade. For years, the amounts were small enough to disappear into a stack of utility bills. She faces up to 10 years in prison.

Hark The Herald: Wednesday, December 25, 2024

In case you missed it

More in You Still Here

Steve Inman: Thursday, June 18, 2026

Bonus Video 1: Thursday, June 18, 2026

Bonus Video 2: Thursday, June 18, 2026

Today In Towing: Thursday, June 18, 2026

Most read