It’s been one year since Sheridan Police Sgt. Nevada Krinkee was killed while on duty.
Personnel at the Sheridan Police Department have been preparing in their own unique ways for the one-year mark of the 33-year-old’s death Thursday, Chief Travis Koltiska told Cowboy State Daily.
“It’s more challenging than I’ve anticipated, even for myself,” he said, adding that he can’t speak for everyone else at the department. “It’s definitely a day of reflection. A day of remembrance for Nevada and the person he was.”
Krinkee was a loving husband to his wife Karla and a good father to their baby, his friends recalled at his funeral last year, March 1, 2024.
Many eulogies at that massively-attended, solemn ceremony shared a common theme: That Krinkee had a servant’s heart and a growing, sincere Christian faith.
Sheridan Police Department Lt. Danny Keller, who was also a leader at Krinkee’s church, delivered a sermon focusing on the Christian ideal that self-sacrifice is the ultimate showing of love.
Krinkee lived out that ideal, not just with his death but with each day he lived, Keller said.
Flags Down
Koltiska asked the city to lower its flags to half-staff Thursday in Krinkee’s honor.
The department also arranged a remembrance call on the local dispatch radio at 11 a.m. The dispatchers cleared the radio traffic for that moment, announced “This is a remembrance call to Sgt. Nevada Krinkee” and recalled the man’s loyalty and integrity.
“His brothers and sisters in blue have it from here,” the call concluded, Koltiska recalled.
Krinkee’s wife Karla, a Sheridan Police Department detective, remains at the department, said the chief.
He said they’re lucky to have her, she’s “an amazing person and an amazing officer.”
The Shooting
On Feb. 13, 2024, Krinkee was serving a trespass notice on Sheridan man William Lowery, who’d been court-ordered to leave an apartment one day earlier.
Lowery fatally shot Krinkee, fled the scene and took refuge in the home of a local woman. She considered Lowery a stranger, the homeowner Karo Hamilton told Cowboy State Daily at the time.
Hamilton was not home at the time, but law enforcement agents worked together to get her ailing mother out of the home, while Lowery hunkered inside and occasionally shot toward law enforcement agents.
Police and SWAT teams surrounded the home, bringing at least one armored BearCat vehicle to the scene along with irritant gas grenades and projectiles, drones, surveillance robots and spotlights.
They made many attempts to negotiate, then flooded the house with gas, light and water.
A local construction worker brought a trackhoe excavator to the scene on Feb. 14, 2024. An operator used it to rip open the roof, and Lowery shot toward the excavator, according to reports from that day.
Lowery fled the home and rushed into the alley. The armored vehicle rocked into motion and pursued Lowery.
A Casper Police Department officer who had come to help with the standoff shot Lowery, and Lowery died on scene.
The city of Sheridan paid Hamilton a $250,000 settlement for her destroyed home that summer, plus $27,000 worth of fee waivers and other payments.
Sheridan Police Sgt. Nevada Krinkee, his wife Karla and their daughter. (Courtesy Kane Funeral Home; Cowboy State Daily Illustration) 
Sgt. Nevada Krinkee's police cruiser is parked in front of the Sheridan Police Department. People have been leaving memorials and messages to the officer who was killed in the line of duty Tuesday. (Pat Maio, Cowboy State Daily) 
Sheridan Police Sgt. Nevada Krinkee, left, is honored on the floor of the U.S. Senate on Wednesday, May 15, 2024, by U.S. Sen. John Barrasso. 
Sheridan residents line the streets downtown Friday to watch a long procession of law enforcement escort the body of Sheridan police Sgt. Nevada Krinkee and his family to a memorial service for the officer, who was killed in the line of duty Feb. 13. (Matt Idler for Cowboy State Daily) 
(Cowboy State Daily Staff)
Solemn Anniversary
Police and sheriff’s agencies issued statements in Krinkee’s memory Thursday.
One of those was the Sweetwater County Sheriff’s Office, which urged a “pause to honor and remember” Krinkee.
That statement also offered a brief biography of the sergeant:
He was born in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and was raised in Bozeman, Montana. He served in the U.S. Army for eight years, including two deployments to Afghanistan, where his courage and dedication earned him numerous commendations.
He began his law enforcement career with the Sheridan Police Department in October 2017. He was promoted to corporal in 2019 and sergeant in 2022.
“A passionate mentor, he took great pride in training and guiding fellow officers, embodying the principles of servant leadership,” says the statement.
“Today, we stand in solidarity with the Sheridan Police Department and the community in remembering Sergeant Nevada Krinkee,” reads the statement. “His sacrifice will never be forgotten.”
Krinkee’s death marked the first homicide of an officer in Wyoming since June 26, 1997.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
