It’s time to take a look at what’s happening around Wyoming for Tuesday, June 2nd, I’m Mac Watson
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A Torrington family is in shock after finding their mutilated dogs partially submerged in the North Platte River. Cowboy State Daily’s Kolby Fedore reports that Angelica Garcia said two people made the grisly discovery of her dogs in the river.
“The Garcia family says that they let their dogs out Friday morning, and they escaped, which was a common occurrence. They were known to get loose and wander about town. Angelica Garcia says that most of the time people would just bring the dogs back, and it kind of became a running joke in the community. The dogs went missing in the afternoon, and were discovered in the early evening by a woman walking with her young son. She found the dogs half submerged in the North Platte River. There were two Rottweilers, and it looked like they'd been blasted by a shotgun, one was missing its head, the other was missing its neck and its chest.”
Goshen County Sheriff Kory Fleenor confirmed Monday that his office has an open investigation into the incident, but declined to comment on whether investigators have determined a cause of death or whether any suspects or persons of interest have been identified.
Read the full story HERE.
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The poll U.S. House candidate Chuck Gray touted Monday leveled disparaging claims about opponents Reid Rasner and Steve Friess. Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports that the poll, conducted by Fabrizio, Lee, and Associates, claims Friess “never had a real job” and Rasner acted like a “Hollywood celebrity” during a marriage to “his gay husband.”
“They concluded that Gray was leading with 21% of the vote if the election were held mid May, but there was also a push poll phase, and I received screenshots shortly after reporting the favorable poll with very charged, very loaded attacks on Reid Rasner and Steve Freese. The commentary about Rasner was dredging up things from his 2020 to 2022 divorce proceedings, including a subjective comment saying he had hyphenated his name like a celebrity. The prompts about Steve Friess were calling him an elitist and calling him out of touch with Wyomingites.”
The survey was a poll of 400 Wyoming Republican voters from May 13-16th and reveals Secretary of State Chuck Gray leads a crowded GOP U.S. House race with 21% support. Casper businessman Reid Rasner is second at 14%, and Teton County's Steve Friess is third at 10%.
Read the full story HERE.
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The family of a woman killed by a distracted driver in downtown Sheridan a year ago said they feel slighted by the 60-day sentence he got Friday. Cowboy State Daily’s Jen Kocher reports that the woman’s daughter says the sentence brings “deeper grief,” not closure.
“Kate Gladden, her daughter does not feel like justice was served, and they were quite disappointed because they had been hoping that the judge might take into consideration their victim statements and charge him with the full penalty under the law, which would be up to a year and $2,000 fine, but that did not happen. She stuck with the plea agreement for 60 days.”
65-year-old Julie Fitzsimmons was visiting her daughter Kate Gladden and her husband Nate, in Sheridan. Julie died of blunt force trauma to the head after being struck and thrown more than 7 feet by the vehicle.
Read the full story HERE.
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A 27-year-old man accused of shooting another man and leaving him bleeding in a Cheyenne street after a blowup over a former girlfriend pleaded not guilty Monday to attempted second-degree murder. Cowboy State Daily’s Greg Johnson reports that Adrian Maggos allegedly asked police how “the guy I shot” was doing.
“He sat quietly along with 11 other inmates from the jail, they all were wearing the bright orange jumpsuits, the orange proxy, he had his legs were shackled together, and when it was his turn, he got up and didn't say much to the judge, just answered his questions, ‘yes sir,’ ‘no sir,’ and when he, when the judge asked him for how he pleaded to the charge of attempted secondary murder, he said, ‘not guilty.’”
The judge then set an Oct. 6 trial date for Maggos, while his attorney informed Judge Hibben that a motion to reduce his $250,000 cash-only bond would be filed in writing.
Read the full story HERE.
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I’ll have more news from Cowboy State Daily right after this.
Cowboy State Daily News continues now….
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A Wyoming barrel racer was stunned to learn that the teen girl accused of stabbing three horses in Las Vegas over the weekend tried to borrow one of her horses last month. Cowboy State Daily’s Julie Mankin reports that Laura Nichols says “It makes my skin crawl to realize she was stalking my horses, too.”
“She said we need to back up about a month ago at a big show in Utah. After that show, I got a message from a random girl out of the blue that wanted to know if I'd let her run one of my horses, and I wanted to help. I didn't really have one, and she just kept asking about these specific horses of mine, and, and so this weekend I looked to see if that was the same person, and it was the accused from Las Vegas, so it's just chilling.”
Nichols, who has earned more than $400,000 competing on the half-brother of one of the stabbed horses, said she’s especially horrified by the attack.
Read the full story HERE.
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A Cody-based search and rescue team helped coordinate the search for the body of “Alaskan Bush People” star Matt Brown. Cowboy State Daily’s Jen Kocher reports that Brown’s body was found Sunday after he went missing four days earlier after allegedly shooting himself along a Washington state river.
“Bill Dohse, who founded Find 911 and OSAR, which is a national search and rescue group with many different partners from around the country. And so what Dohse did in this particular instance was work with his partner agencies to deploy assets to the scene in Washington, which was extremely remote and near the Canadian border, and the sheriff's department and family were very grateful to have those assets on the ground. Dosey was able to work from his incident command center on the side of the road because he was en route to Washington to get there when Brown was found.”
Dohse, a former Fremont County Deputy Sheriff and Wyoming Highway Patrol trooper, founded the Cody-based search and rescue group founded in 2015 that specializes in finding missing people and pets.
Read the full story HERE.
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This year's election climate could make the perfect storm for Libertarian Shawn Johnson to win Wyoming's U.S. House seat, politicos say. Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports that experts say if Johnson can court conservatives, and the winner of the GOP primary is hugely unpopular, he could have a shot.
“Sean Johnson gave a speech at his Sunday nomination at the Libertarian Party convention, that was, I mean, it was visibly electrifying to the attendees, and I got to thinking about it later. It very much resembled the Declaration of Independence, where there was this list of grievances, grievance after grievance of tyrannies that the people have endured, and it ended with this, this call for revival, and this pledge of one's own honor to the cause. And I asked him Monday, did you mean to structure that like the Declaration of Independence? He's like, no, he was just speaking from the heart.”
Johnson will face the lone survivor of a hotly contested 10-person GOP primary contest, and the winner of a two-way Democratic primary election. Both major party primary elections are set for Aug. 18.
Read the full story HERE.
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Fifty years ago, the cameras rolled on “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” at Devils Tower after a handshake between a then-unknown Steven Spielberg and rancher Jesse Thomas Driskill. Cowboy State Daily’s Renee Jean reports that a high school student named Ogden Driskell (who would later grow up to be a current state senator) remembers Spielberg was adamant about not telling anyone about the movie before it debuted.
“It was a funny story that Ogden told Spielberg swore them to secrecy about the movie because he didn't want the public to see that tower before the movie came out. He was just sure, you know, that nationwide people had not seen, did not know about this tower, and he knew the kind of impression it was going to make. His dad's the one who made the deal with Steven Spielberg, and Spielberg's like, ‘I don't want anybody to know about that tower. Nobody knows about that tower. You have to keep it secret. Don't let anybody know what's going on.’ But you know, so August, like, well, they thought he was kind of crazy.”
Close Encounters of the Third Kind was a blockbuster science fiction movie that was released in 1977. Written and directed by Steven Spielberg, it would go on to completely reshape tourism in northeast Wyoming.
Read the full story HERE.
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And that’s today’s news. Get your free digital subscription to Wyoming's only statewide newspaper by hitting the Daily Newsletter button on Cowboy State Daily Dot Com - and you can watch this newscast every day by clicking Subscribe on our YouTube channel, or listen to us on your favorite podcast app. Thanks for watching - I’m Mac Watson, for Cowboy State Daily.
