CHEYENNE — Facing up to 50 years in prison on accusations she starved her then-50-pound, 13-year-old son, his adopted mother has agreed to plead guilty in return for a sentence of 15-17 years.
If the judge in her case accepts the terms, Angela Mittlestadt, 49, has agreed to plead guilty to a charge of aggravated child abuse while a second charge of conspiracy to commit aggravated child abuse will be dismissed, according to a copy of the agreement filed in Laramie County District Court.
A Monday hearing has been scheduled for the plea deal, just ahead of the Tuesday start of a jury trial for her and her 50-year-old husband, Darrick M. Mittlestadt, who is a former Laramie County Fire District 1 chief.
His trial on the same aggravated and conspiracy to commit aggravated child abuse charges is still set to begin Tuesday, according to court records.
The potential plea deal and trial come more than a year after the couple were arrested and following multiple delays of their court proceedings.
In an order after their final court continuance was granted this past summer, Judge Peter Froelicher told the couple that they can’t put it off any longer.
“It is finally ordered that no further continuances will be granted absent a showing of extraordinary circumstances,” the judge wrote in his order setting a firm date of Sept. 22 for their joint trial to begin.
Dropped Off
An investigation into the couple began on June 22, 2025, after the Laramie County Sheriff’s Office was contacted by a youth support agency in Douglas about the condition of the Mittlestadts’ then-13-year-old adopted son.
The boy had been dropped off at the Youth Development Center there by Angela, according to an affidavit of probable cause filed in their cases.
“Douglas police officers noted that (the teen) was extremely thin and appeared severely malnourished,” the affidavit states. The teen’s “ribs, collarbones and other bones and joints were protruding and clearly visible on him due to how thin he was.”
The boy “also was missing much of the hair on his head,” according to an affidavit filed in the case.
The teen initially gave staff at the Youth Development Center another name and incorrect date of birth.
He told a Douglas police officer that, “I’m only allowed to eat one meal a day since there’s no point in giving me food,” the affidavit says.
During a follow-up forensic interview of the teen in Casper, he told a Child Advocacy Project interviewer that his mom, Angela Mittlestadt, had dropped him off and told him to knock on the door and tell them he “needed somewhere to live.”
When asked why he was told to do that, the teen replied, “I don’t know, she just told me that to tell them that for some reason.”
Not ‘Anyone Else’s Problem’
The boy described his living conditions at the Mittlestadt home as having his bedroom door blocked with heavy items from the outside so that he couldn’t leave his room, according to court documents.
He told his interviewer that he “wasn’t very nice and did stuff he shouldn’t have done such as wetting the bed and picking at himself.”
The teen said he was given white bread, ham and vegetables once a day along with “Zero Gatorade.” He was just getting one meal because of the way that he “behaved.”
A Laramie County Sheriff’s Office detective interviewed both parents June 23, 2025, after authorities took their younger adopted son, 6, into protective custody.
Angela Mittlestadt told the investigator that when she got the teen as a boy, he was homeless, malnourished and a “f***ed up kid with trauma.”
“I’m an idiot and thought I could help him,” she told the investigator, according to the affidavit. She alleged that he refused to do school, lacked feeling, remorse, empathy and “didn’t care about rewards or consequences.”
Angela Mittlestadt said the teen was malnourished because he refused to eat and rarely slept at night.
She also said he would “pee” and defecate in his room instead of the bathroom.
She said she had not asked for help because she felt the teen was not “anyone else’s problem.”
When she awoke June 22 and smelled “poop,” she drove him to the center in Douglas.
She said when her husband was away working, it was “overwhelming” for her to deal with the teen and the younger boy. When she just had the younger boy, things were fine, she told the investigator.
Crackers And Protein Shakes
Darrick Mittlestadt told the investigator that his wife had lost a family member several years ago and believed that adopting the two boys was how she “dealt” with that loss.
He said he and his wife fed the boy, but that he rarely slept. He said he was often away from home because of his job.
“I failed everyone, because I didn’t do my job,” he said.
The teen told authorities that items had been taken from his room and that he never left the house in Cheyenne except to shower or brush his teeth.
He told his interviewer that he had not been out of the house for two years and was not allowed to leave his room, watch TV, play with his brother or go to the fire station with his dad, the affidavit says.
Darrick Mittlestadt denied that the teen had been in the house for years. He said he would walk around the property with the boy and look for cactus, but that the child was so thin and weak he could not use a shovel to dig.
So, he would dig cactus for him.
“Darrick acknowledged that (the teen) hadn’t been to a park, children’s museum or anything similar since they moved to Cheyenne almost two years ago,” the affidavit states.
He, too, said the teen lied about things like reading a book, completing schoolwork, or using the bathroom before urinating or defecating in his room.
During the interview at the Mittlestadt home, the investigator said he was shown the teen’s bedroom, and it was apparently recently cleaned with vacuum marks on the carpet.
It had no “clutter” and the closet had crackers and protein shakes.
“When Darrick was asked about them, he explained that they were normally kept in the kitchen or another closet,” the investigator wrote. “They were used as a reward for (the teen) to engage in better behavior.
“Darrick never really explained why the crackers and protein shakes were currently in (the teen’s) closet.”
Both the aggravated and conspiracy to commit child abuse charges carry maximum penalties of up to 25 years in prison.
That means convictions on both charges with max penalties ordered to be served consecutively could mean up to 50 years behind bars.
Greg Johnson can be reached at greg@cowboystatedaily.com.
