A Daniel, Wyoming, man apologized in court Thursday for tormenting a wolf two years ago, after he pleaded guilty to felony animal cruelty.
Cody Roberts, 45, appeared in person Thursday morning in Sublette County District Court in a dark suit, jeans and boots, alongside his attorney Robert Piper.
“I’d just like to say I sincerely regret my actions,” said Roberts, adding that he apologizes to the community and his family. His voice thickened slightly as he said he hopes “everyone can heal and move forward.”
About 14 people sat in the court gallery.
Roughly 12 feet away from Roberts, Sweetwater County District Court Judge Richard Lavery — who’s been filling in for a recused Pinedale judge — told Roberts the rights he’d forfeit by pleading guilty.
“You should assume that you’ll never be allowed to have a gun,” Lavery said, while listing other consequences of a felony conviction like losing the right to vote, hold public office, serve on a jury; and having to submit one’s DNA to the state.
When Lavery asked Roberts for his plea, the man answered “Guilty, Your Honor.”
Roberts’ plea agreement said he may plead guilty or no contest. The plea says that if Lavery accepts the plea agreement, Roberts would spend 18 months on a probationary term that forbids alcohol use or proximity, requires addiction treatment, and bans hunting including shed hunting and fishing – plus a $1,000 fine.
If he violates probation, Roberts could be sentenced to between 18 months and two years in prison and pay another $4,000 in fines.
The case prosecutor, Sublette County Attorney Clayton Melinkovich, gave a “factual basis” or a list of evidence showing Roberts’ guilty plea fits his potential conviction for animal cruelty.
In the daytime Feb. 9, 2024, Roberts captured a gray wolf under circumstances Melinkovich doesn’t know exactly, he said. Earlier witness statements indicate the capture happened on private land in a predator zone in Sublette County, Melinkovich said.
Roberts kept the wolf through the day and into the evening, then killed it, said the prosecutor.
But first, that evening, Roberts brought the animal to an establishment in Daniel, asking if anyone in the bar had lost a dog, Melinkovich continued.
A bar patron watched Roberts pick up the wolf and place it on the ground, with a leash on it. It walked with difficulty, and limped into the bar, where it against a wall and near a coat rack, said Melinkovich.
Roberts posed for a photograph and video in which he’d knelt, pulled the wolf’s head toward his own and tried to kiss it – prompting it to growl, added the prosecutor.
Later Roberts carried out of the bar “like a baby,” Melinkovich said.
The prosecutor said that had this case gone to trial as it was originally scheduled to Monday, an expert witness would have testified that wolves that are physically able to avoid humans try to do so.
This wolf’s apparent disinterest in fleeing revealed that it was unable to do so, asserted Melinkovich from that account.
Melinkovich’s version of events was “pretty close” to Roberts’ recollection of them, the defendant said under questioning by Lavery.
He said he didn’t dispute the account.
Lavery said he appreciates Roberts’ public apology.
The judge turned to the prosecutor and defense attorney and addressed the plea agreement.
“I appreciate the work that the parties did on this,” said Lavery, adding that he can appreciate that attorneys often craft plea agreements because both sides “see risk” in going to trial.
“There sure are a lot of people out there who would like to know why there was a plea agreement in this case,” said Lavery.
His judicial assistant has received countless phone calls and more than 5,000 emails, said Lavery.
He told the listening public that he doesn’t read those emails, because that would be forbidden “ex parte communication” about an ongoing case.
“It falls on deaf ears,” said Lavery. “I won’t be reading those emails, and I won’t be talking to anyone.”
Roberts has remained out of jail on a signature bond.
Lavery added conditions while Roberts waits for sentencing, that he be law abiding, have no guns or dangerous deadly weapons, avoid alcohol, drugs, and places where they’re served or sold; that he submit to a search or testing upon reasonable suspicion by law enforcement, and that he schedule the interviews the probation and parole office must conduct for his pre-sentence investigation report.
The pre-sentence investigation report, which Lavery ordered, is a history and assessment of a defendant, which a judge reviews before sentencing him.
Lavery stressed that he won’t accept or reject Roberts’ plea agreement until he’s read that report.
Sentencing is to happen at a later date.
This Saga
The incident with the wolf exploded into international headlines, sparking outrage across the globe from sportsmen and animal rights activists, and it put both the Wyoming Game and Fish Department and Wyoming’s wildlife management laws under a microscope.
Roberts was indicted last August by a grand jury. Felony animal cruelty carries a penalty of up to two years in prison and up to $5,000 in fines.
The indictment followed claims that Roberts ran over a wolf with a snowmobile, brought it injured and muzzled into a bar in Daniel, taunted it and later killed it.
He originally paid a $250 fine for possessing wildlife.
The citation was from a part of law that doesn’t actually match the nature of the allegations, however, which could be one of the reasons Roberts’ felony case didn’t fall to a double jeopardy issue. The other is that the citation and felony charge contain different elements.
Melinkovich had sought to wage a more serious prosecution in the case in 2024, but struggled with the evidence he had at the time, he told Cowboy State Daily in an August phone interview.
“It took so long because evidence needed to be processed,” Melinkovich said. “We finally got all the evidence back from processing in November (2024).”
The prosecutor didn’t think it made sense to undertake grand jury proceedings over the holidays, he said.
As January turned to February 2025, a compound bow murder diverted his focus, Melinkovich added.
He requested the grand jury in June, and it convened in the second and third weeks of August, Melinkovich said.
Doxxed
As to why Melinkovich called the grand jury rather than launching a charge on his own probable cause narrative of the evidence, Melinkovich indicated there wasn’t enough evidence for that.
The investigation had stalled prior because people didn’t want to talk to law enforcement, he said.
“I speculate that (silence) is because of such national and international pressure, and people’s fear of being doxed if people knew they knew information — or were (in the bar) that night,” said Melinkovich.
Witnesses generally don’t have to talk to law enforcement, but a grand jury can subpoena people and make them talk, with some Constitution-based exceptions.
He declined to say whether those reticent sources produced the missing pieces this month, saying that would disclose the confidential grand jury witness testimony.
Though already penalized, Roberts can still be charged with a different law for the same conduct — if the newer charge differs enough in its elements from the citation to satisfy a judge that Roberts’ right against double jeopardy isn’t being violated.
Legal Arguments
Roberts’ attorney, Robert Piper, argued in court in January that Wyoming’s exception to its animal cruelty statute — rendering immune from prosecution acts of hunting, capture, killing and destruction not otherwise prohibited by law — should block Roberts from being prosecuted.
Lavery later denied that motion.
“I tend to think the defendant’s broad definition of the predator exception goes too far,” said Lavery at the time. “It just seems a bridge too far to say the state can’t pursue a case that constitutes torture or torment to an animal (under that exception).”
That echoed in part Melinkovich’s argument that Roberts’ encounter with the wolf was not one long capture, and that the portion of law during which Roberts allegedly behaved cruelly was a “possession” of the wolf, which isn’t a carveout under the law.
Upend Wyoming's Laws
The argument last month hinged upon whether Melinkovich’s theory — that Roberts committed an act of cruelty not allowed by law and not covered by the exceptions — would upend Wyoming’s laws allowing wildlife hunting sports that could cause an animal to suffer.
Piper gave examples like trapping, bow hunting and black powder rifle hunting.
Amid testimony over this case, the state Legislature added a ban on torturing wildlife to its animal cruelty statute last year.
Piper argued that this act shows that the law didn’t cover Roberts’ conduct already.
Roberts captured the wolf in late February 2024, before the law was changed, reportedly.
State Of Mind
Melinkovich countered in his argument, saying his interpretation of the law and decision to pursue a felony case on that don’t jeopardize hunting and trapping in Wyoming.
That’s because the state’s definition for torture or torment includes a state of mind, he said.
The definition calls torment and torture “every act, omission or neglect whereby the willful and malicious infliction of pain or suffering is caused, permitted or allowed to continue when there is a reasonable remedy or relief.”
To torture an animal illegally, a person must harbor willfulness and malice toward that act in his mind, Melinkovich said.
“There’s nowhere any risk whatsoever, that a person hunting, lawfully hunting, can be subject to these statutes - because the intent is not there,” added the prosecutor.
