Two Wyoming-based federal judges ruled in two separate but similar use-of-force cases in favor of the city of Cheyenne and its police officers on the same day, and on the same grounds, earlier this month.
The two cases share nearly all the same attorneys, too.
Devon Petersen, who sued Cheyenne and some of its individual police officers on behalf of Leo Varos and Joann Ockinga, told Cowboy State Daily on Friday that he’s considering potential options for appeal.
Amy Iberlin, who represented Cheyenne, called the city’s matching wins “the absolute right result for all the parties involved, and also on behalf of the city of Cheyenne.”
“We always strive to meet and exceed safety (standards) for individuals as well as comply with policies and procedures, and our officers are doing the same,” added Iberlin in a Friday phone interview.
Tim Miller of the Wyoming Attorney General’s Office represented the police officers and declined Friday to comment.
Qualified Immunity
Both judges ended both cases March 2 on the same legal grounds.
Wyoming-based U.S. District Court Judge Scott Skavdahl’s order gives Cheyenne and one of its officers a pre-trial win over Ockinga, and Wyoming-based U.S. District Court Judge Alan B. Johnson’s order gives the city and two, different officers a win over Varos.
The officers won summary, or pre-trial judgment because their actions didn’t rise to the level of obvious constitutional breaches that can pierce through qualified immunity, the orders say.
The city won summary judgment because the plaintiffs’ own claims gave them a duty to show the city’s training or rules fell outside constitutional bounds; but they didn’t show that, both judges wrote.
The Moviegoers
Ockinga in November 2024 accused a Cheyenne Police Officer Alyssa Muzquiz of ripping her out of her car and breaking her foot after a minor traffic incident that happened July 8, 2023.
That was after Ockinga, whose complaint says she’s an intellectually disabled adult, drove to Cheyenne from Wheatland that day with her two daughters and her son-in-law, who also have learning disabilities.
The family went shopping and to the movies. As they prepared to go back to Wheatland, Ockinga’s son-in-law backed the car up and bumped into a truck at a low speed, so Ockinga called police to report the incident.
Muzquiz responded to the scene and asked Ockinga to get her insurance information
Ockinga searched in her glove compartment but couldn’t find current insurance information. She was nervous and having a hard time understanding the officer’s instructions, wrote Petersen in the complaint.
Muzquiz tried talking to the son-in-law, Noah, who’d been driving, but Ockinga grew agitated and tried to keep the pair apart since Noah’s mother had told her not to let the man speak to police, court documents say.
Skavdahl’s order says Ockinga was repeatedly disobeying Muzquiz’s orders not to interfere, and that Muzquiz didn’t have any reason at that juncture to know that Ockinga was intellectually disabled.
Muzquiz pulled Ockinga from her car, struggled with her, then brought her to the ground and arrested her for interference.
The plaintiff and the judge disagree about at least part of that struggle.
Ockinga had asserted she was “violently ripped” from her car, and Skavdahl countered, “video evidence clearly contradicts this version of the facts.”
Ockinga’s complaint says: “Officer Muzquiz broke Ms. Ockinga’s ankle, threw Ms. Ockinga onto her right knee, which had recently been replaced in a major surgery, and bruised Ms. Ockinga’s arms,” assaulting her.
Skavdahl put it differently, writing that after Ockinga dove into her car after Muzquiz informed Ockinga she’d be arrested for police interference. The women struggled for 10 seconds inside Ockinga’s open car door; Muzquiz grabbed Ockinga’s arm and tried to pull her toward the open car door – succeeding after many tries, wrote the judge.
“Her active resistance inside the vehicle necessitated using increased force to pull her out of the vehicle,” added Skavdahl.
Ockinga kept resisting arrest by walking around in circles and pushing Muzquiz away from her.
Skavdahl called it a “skirmish” that became increasingly agitated between two women matched in stature. Muzquiz ultimately wrapped her foot around Ockinga’s leg and pushed her shoulders, toppling her.
Twenty seconds more of struggle passed before Muzquiz was able to handcuff Ockinga, the order says.
“At the precise moment Officer Muzquiz used the foot maneuver, she was a lone female officer, struggling with an actively resisting individual, approximately her height, of heavier weight, and near a running vehicle containing Plaintiff’s three family members,” wrote Skavdahl.
He called Muzquiz’s use of force appropriate for the circumstances. That means that in the judge’s order, Muzquiz’s maneuvers didn’t violate a clearly established constitutional right, which means they didn’t dissolve her qualified immunity from being sued as an individual.
Dislocated
In January 2025, Leo Varos accused Cheyenne Police Department Officers Mike Webster and Emily Taraski of dislocating his elbow and parts of his wrist during a DUI stop on Jan. 8, 2023, and he accused the city of Cheyenne of failing to train its officers properly.
“Over the last several years, the Cheyenne Police Department has repeatedly violated the constitutional rights of various citizens,” wrote Petersen in the complaint.
Webster stopped Varos for driving in Cheyenne with no headlights on Jan. 8, 2023, and when Varos lowered his window, Webster smelled alcohol and ordered Varos to exit the vehicle, court documents say.
Varos refused to exit the vehicle.
Webster and Taraski grabbed Varos by the wrist, forcefully removed him and took him to the ground, the complaint says. It adds that Varos warned he had a “bad arm,” but the officers used “significant force to wrench” Varos’ arm behind his back as he yelled in pain.
Varos at the time of his filing was 65, with a reconstructed right shoulder and limited right arm mobility.
The “wrenching” dislocated his shoulder, requiring multiple surgeries, Petersen wrote.
When the officers asked Johnson to judge the case early in their favor, Varos filed medical documents in support of his claims, but those were “hearsay” under the Constitution.
That means Johnson couldn’t consider them as evidence, he wrote.
The judge related scenes from both officers’ body camera video, however, concluding Webster grabbed Varos’ right arm and Taraski grabbed Varos’ left arm.
“There is no evidence that Officer Taraski ever touched Varos’s right arm,” wrote Johnson, saying the case doesn’t show she used excessive force.
As for Webster, he had probable cause to arrest Varos for DUI and it was reasonable for him to handcuff Varos, the judge wrote, adding, “Varos’ blood alcohol level was .274.”
Varos had told officers he had a bad arm.
Saying so “could not reasonably have made Officer Webster aware of the fact that Varos had a surgically reconstructed shoulder that restricted the range of motion in his right arm,” added Johnson.
The Way The City Trains Its Own
Both Ockinga and Varos brought claims against Cheyenne, saying the city’s training and management fall outside constitutional bounds.
To sue a city for violating one’s federal constitutional rights, a person has to show that the city’s custom drove the injury he suffered, or that the city was so deliberately indifferent to the consequences that it allowed inadequate hiring, training or supervision of personnel.
Varos asserted that he was trying to get information on whether the city failed to discipline its officers properly, but the city “refused” to give evidence to that end. He asked the court to recognize his struggle to get information.
But Varos didn’t back that concern with an affidavit nor explain how the missing evidence would help his claim against the city, and the city had given him “significant discovery, including use of force reports and complaints by Officers Taraski and Webster,” Johnson countered.
The judge added that there’s no evidence either officer has been sued or disciplined for excessive force.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
