A Gillette man faces a charge of attempted murder after police accuse him of pistol whipping and then trying to shoot his sister’s friend Monday after police found him dangling from his apartment window pointing a handgun at the victim lying on the ground.
Jodie Wood, 54, has been charged with one count of attempted second-degree murder with a firearm and felony aggravated assault and battery. He’s being held at the Campbell County Detention Center on a $500,000 cash-only bond.
If convicted, Wood faces between 20 and 50 years in prison, fines up to $20,000, or both.
Wood made his initial court appearance Tuesday in Campbell County Circuit Court before Magistrate Judge Denise Urbin, where he declared his innocence.
Wood denies the charges, claiming he had been sitting at his kitchen table talking on the phone with his mother when the alleged incident took place.
He later clarified that the handgun in question was not his and that he was protecting himself from the alleged victim, Michael Stedman.
“I’m not a violent person. I don’t want to hurt nobody,” Wood told the judge. “I defended myself. That’s all I did.”
Three Visits From Police
An affidavit filed in the case tells a different story based on the Gillette Police Department officer’s multiple contacts with Wood on Monday afternoon.
An officer first made contact with Wood at around 1:20 p.m. at his apartment on Gurley Avenue after police had been called to respond to a disturbance involving Wood and his sister, who had been in a verbal argument.
When police arrived, both said they were fine and that they didn’t need help.
About an hour later, Wood called police to ask for a welfare check on his sister because he said she’d attempted to take her life the night before. Police then checked on her at her male friend’s house, but both said they were fine.
Less than 30 minutes later, police were called back to Wood’s apartment for a disturbance outside between three people reportedly arguing and threatening each other.
The officer arrived to reportedly find the other man lying in a fetal position on the grass a few feet from the apartment with a bleeding laceration above his nose.
He further observed Wood leaning out of his second-story apartment window above him pointing a .45 caliber Thompson semi-automatic 1911 handgun at the man, according to the affidavit filed in the case.
Wood initially claimed it was a BB gun but dropped the handgun on the roof when instructed by police to do so.
‘Write That Down’
The man told police that he gave Wood the gun earlier in his apartment, and that Wood pistol-whipped him with it. The alleged victim later recanted, telling police that Wood never pistol-whipped him, but had accidentally struck him in the face with a cabinet door.
The man told police he loved “his brother” and didn’t want him to get into trouble, court records say.
Wood, however, told police that the man had brought the gun into his apartment and threatened him with it, causing the two to get into an argument, according to the affidavit.
He further told police he doesn’t like the man because he thinks he’s a bad influence on his sister and told her she needed to leave his home and stay elsewhere.
When questioned by a second officer, Wood stated that he knew the gun was real and that the man would be dead right now if he’d pulled the trigger.
“I tried to kill him. Yeah, write that down,” Wood allegedly said to the police officer.
After reviewing his body cam footage of the incident, the arriving officer deemed that Wood had allegedly pulled the trigger based on his position and reflexes, but the shot likely didn’t fire because of a secondary grip safety specific to this type of handgun.
Based on Wood’s earlier admission to police that he had reportedly pulled the trigger with the intent of shooting him, the officer determined he had not been acting in self-defense.
Once at the Campbell County Detention Center, Wood reportedly told detention staff that he was in jail for aggravated assault and that he would “aggravate assault him again, too,” according to affidavit.
Wood’s preliminary hearing is scheduled for 9 a.m. March 26 in Campbell County Circuit Court.
Jen Kocher can be reached at jen@cowboystatedaily.com.
