Randy Kane was sound asleep in the wee hours Nov. 23, 2023, when, without warning, absolute chaos broke loose.
“All of the sudden there were lots of lights going on outside, pounding on the door and people screaming at us to come out,” Kane told Cowboy State Daily.
‘I Got The Full-Blown Mob Squad’
A team of federal agents, armed and in full gear, showed up at the door of the home he shares with Noreen Scroggins in Big Horn, a small community in Sheridan County, he said.
The agents were there to serve a search warrant for Kane’s house, pickup and person. The warrant was based upon accusations that, as a convicted felon, he was in illegal possession of numerous firearms.
Kane and Scroggins said they were baffled because, as they understood it, Kane’s firearms rights had been restored by the state of Wyoming.
And he had a certificate from Gov. Mark Gordon’s office to prove it.
But the time for those arguments would come later, Kane said. In the moment, he felt he had no choice but to comply.
“I got the full-blown mob squad. I think if I had resisted, they would have shot me,” he said.
“I had so many red dots on me, I felt like I was a porcupine,” Kane added, in reference to laser sights on the agents’ firearms.
Scroggins said she was also terrified.
“It was hell,” she told Cowboy State Daily.
“There were all these ATF agents with guns and body armor and drones,” she said. “They had already pulled Randy out of the house.”
They both ended up in handcuffs, spending much of that cold morning sitting in agents’ vehicles.
Kane said he was forcibly pulled from the house, wearing only undershorts and a T-shirt.
Scroggins was also unprepared to be outside in the cold.
“I just had my nightshirt on,” she said.
She added that when she hesitated to go outside, an agent threatened to come drag her out of the house.
Confusion Between State, Federal Laws
The raid might have resulted from a gap between Wyoming statutes and federal laws regarding restoring the rights of non-violent felony offenders.
A Wyoming statute restoring gun rights to nonviolent felons who had served their terms went into effect in 2023.
However, it remained uncertain whether that applied to people with felony convictions in federal courts.
That’s because the federal government still regards it as illegal for felons, even nonviolent ones, to possess firearms.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) on Feb. 14, 2024, issued a statement warning that the Wyoming rights restoration statute doesn’t cover federal convictions.
“The (state) certificate purports to restore an individual’s firearm rights, which were lost because of a federal court conviction,” the agency’s alert said. “ATF is in the process of notifying those affected individuals, by letter, that the Restoration of Rights certificate issued by the State of Wyoming DOES NOT restore their rights to possess firearms and/or ammunition under federal law.”
Bill Aims To Fix The Problem
Mark Jones of Buffalo, the national director of Gun Owners of America (GOA), has long been critical of that gap between state and federal laws.
Last year, he warned legislators of what he considered to be a flaw in the Wyoming statutes.
Testifying before a legislative committee during the 2024 session, he used the story of what happened to Kane and Scroggins as an example of the peril the flawed statue could bring to Wyomingites.
He didn’t reveal the couple’s names at that time.
A bill expected to be introduced during the current legislative session could fix the problem, Jones said.
Rep. Jeremy Haroldson, R-Wheatland, told Cowboy State Daily on Monday that he plans to introduce a bill to “clarify” the status of the restoration of gun rights for nonviolent felons.
He added that the bill had not yet been formally introduced or assigned a number.
Jones said that GOA attorneys had “helped craft that legislation.”
Part of the bill’s intent is to prevent what happened to Kane and Scroggins from happening to anybody else, he said.
Governor’s Certificate
Kane, 63, is a Sheridan County native and said his family has lived there for generations.
He said he was convicted of a nonviolent felony drug offense in federal court more than 20 years ago.
He chalked it up to poor decisions at the time, and said he served about 2 ½ years in a South Dakota prison as a result.
“What I did was wrong, and I did whatever I had to do to pay the consequences,” he said.
He came home with new resolve to get his life back on track and said he’s worked hard and kept out of trouble ever since.
He loved serving with the Big Horn Volunteer Fire Department, though he recently retired from the department.
Kane also loves to hunt. And he was set to inherit a collection of firearms from his grandfather and father.
When he was convicted, his mother put those guns in safe storage, Kane said.
He said that when he found out about the Wyoming statute allowing the restoration of rights, he applied for it. He was approved and issued a certificate from the governor’s office.
Scroggins, 73, has no criminal record, and had some firearms of her own in the house.
She and Kane both said they were under the impression that although Kane might not be able to buy any new firearms for himself, he was legally clear to possess them.
Delighted at the news, Kane said he retrieved his family heirloom gun collection from storage and was soon out hunting again.
“Everything was fine, life was good again,” he said.
‘What Bombs? What Grenades?’
Scroggins had only just returned home from visiting family in another state when the raid occurred.
As the morning unfolded, she said she was utterly confused about what was going on, and why.
At one point, an agent asked her whether there were bombs and grenades on the property, she said.
“I said, ‘What bombs? What grenades? What are you talking about?’”
Kane said he was asked the same question and was likewise confused by it.
“I had guns that came from my grandad to my dad, to me. A lot of them had sentimental value. I didn’t have any bazookas, or bombs and grenades. They were just regular shotguns, hunting rifles and .22s,” he said.
They both said that they told agents about Kane’s certificate showing his restoration of rights, which was in the kitchen, but got no response.
Gun Safe Ripped Open
Scroggins said most of her guns were in one safe, while Kane’s collection was in another gun safe that she had bought for him.
Opening the safe containing Kane’s guns was “tricky,” she said.
Agents took him into the basement, where that gun safe was, and told him to open it – but he was struggling to do so, she said.
Scroggins said that when she offered to help open Kane’s gun safe, she was ignored.
A crew from the fire department – firefighters that Kane served with – was called in and used the “jaws of life” to rip the gun safe open, Kane said.
The jaws of life are a power tool used to rip apart mangled cars, to remove vehicle crash victims.
Kane said he felt terrible to see his fellow firefighters ordered to do that.
“They are a great bunch of people. I can’t believe they were put in that position,” he said.
The Guns Are Still Gone
The agents cleared the scene at about noon. The left the house in disarray. And besides ruining the safe, they broke several items during their search, Scroggins said.
Kane said the ATF seized 38 of his firearms, along with a few of Scroggins’ guns.
Kane said he was never arrested or served with any charges. His lawyer recently told him that he’s out of any legal peril.
The couple said that they still haven’t gotten any of their seized guns back.
ATF Denver Field Division spokeswoman Crystal McCoy told Cowboy State Daily in an email message that she isn’t “familiar with this case.”
She said she would look into it, although it might take some time.
Kane said they’ve tried to get back to a normal life, but the raid left them with lingering confusion and fear.
He said he still has trouble sleeping sometimes.
“It’s overwhelming, just being in my shoes and trying to tell the story,” he said.
One bright spot is having Jones and his gun rights advocacy group to back them up.
“He (Jones) has been great. I’m glad that I got lined up with him,” Kane said.
Mark Heinz can be reached at mark@cowboystatedaily.com.
