What started as a routine Friday morning delivery of paper towels and other supplies to the Wyoming Rescue Mission ended with a mangled Bargreen Ellingson van sitting in the grass alongside Interstate 25, its windshield shattered, roof crushed and cargo scattered around it.
Casper Police arrested Mason Owens, 23, on recommended charges of aggravated assault and battery, grand theft, reckless driving and failure to fulfill his duty after colliding with an unattended vehicle.
Police call logs show officers were dispatched at 9:24 a.m. Friday to the 200 block of North Park Street for a reported vehicle theft. Cowboy State Daily reached out to Casper Police and submitted a records request Monday morning seeking additional details about the incident, but had not received a response by publication time.
The detailed allegations against Owens had not yet been filed in court Monday, but Skyler Larson, 24, was there when it began.
Friday Delivery
Larson was dropping off supplies at the Rescue Mission for Bargreen Ellingson, a local restaurant and food-service supply company.
Larson drove the company van down the alley behind the building and pulled up near the back door, where deliveries are made.
It was cold that morning, he said, and he expected to be inside only briefly, so he left the van running as he began unloading.
As Larson worked, a man approached and began asking him questions. The conversation seemed casual enough at first.
Larson continued toward the back door with his hands full and waited for someone inside to let him in.
That's when he started watching the man more closely.
“He was kind of creeping over and looking into the van,” Larson told Cowboy State Daily.
Standing at the door waiting to be buzzed inside, Larson said, “I kind of got a bad feeling.”
Still, Larson had a delivery to make. Someone opened the door. He carried the supplies inside.
By the time Larson came back out, his van was moving down the alley.
Fight Or Flight
Larson ran.
“It was kind of just a fight-or-flight thing,” he said.
At first, he figured he didn't have a chance.
He remembers thinking there was “no way” he was going to catch a moving van on foot, but then something unexpected happened.
The driver stopped.
Larson said he believes it was because the van's sliding cargo door was still hanging open and the driver wanted to close it.
Whatever the reason, the stop gave Larson an opening.
He caught up to the van, reached the driver's side, opened the door and grabbed at the man behind the wheel, trying to pull him out.
Then the driver hit the gas.
Larson was still alongside the van as it accelerated down the alley. As the space narrowed, Larson found himself squeezed between the moving van and a telephone pole.
“He clipped me on a telephone pole, and I had lost him,” Larson said.
That ended the chase.
Larson was left with cuts to his left wrist while the van sped away. He estimated it was already going 40 mph or faster as it disappeared.
Only then did Larson have a chance to process how quickly an ordinary delivery had gone sideways.
Awkward Call
Larson called his boss.
“You’re really not gonna be happy with me,” he told him.
The delivery van had just been stolen.
Larson said that at first, his boss thought he was joking.
It didn't take long for him to realize he wasn't.
People around Casper began calling Bargreen Ellingson after spotting the company's distinctive delivery van careening through town.
“We were getting calls of people saying, ‘Hey, I think your driver's under the influence,’” coworker Tom Branson told Cowboy State Daily.
Branson had to explain that whoever was behind the wheel wasn't one of their drivers. The van had been stolen.
Meanwhile, the reports coming back to the company became increasingly alarming.
“I mean, stuff was flying out of the van,” Branson said.
Construction Zone
Branson said the company learned that the van went beneath the McKinley Street bridge, where the roadway was closed for construction, at a high rate of speed.
“The road, that spot under the McKinley Bridge, is closed, and it was closed on Friday, and he went through there,” Branson said.
The danger of barreling through the construction area isn't hypothetical, he added. Workers were using a scissor lift beneath the bridge later that same day.
Branson also was told a pursuing police officer had to drive onto the sidewalk to get around the construction.
The van continued north on McKinley Street, he said, eventually striking the North Casper Clubhouse.
A photograph shows damage outside the clubhouse, including a bent metal railing beside its entrance and pieces of broken vehicle bodywork scattered across the sidewalk and street.
Branson said reports reaching the company put the van at more than 90 mph during portions of the episode.
The GPS Keeps Moving North
Bargreen Ellingson didn't completely lose track of its van. Branson said the company could follow its location using a GPS tracker.
It kept moving north. Eventually, the van made its way onto Interstate 25 and continued away from Casper.
Branson said it was still traveling at speeds exceeding 90 mph before the trip finally ended around mile marker 233, roughly 40 miles north of Casper and about 20 miles south of Kaycee.
There, the van rolled.
He said the driver appeared to escape the wreck without significant injury, was taken to a hospital and was later booked into jail.
Cowboy State Daily contacted the Wyoming Highway Patrol on Monday seeking details about the interstate portion of the incident, including the speeds involved, whether troopers pursued the van, what caused it to roll and whether anyone was injured.
Casper Police also was asked for its reports detailing the theft and what happened before the van left the city. Neither agency had responded by publication.
What's Left
Photographs of the van after the crash show the toll of the trip.
The white Ford Transit is sitting upright in the grass amid the rolling, treeless hills alongside the interstate.
Its roof is deeply crushed and buckled above the driver's side. The windshield is shattered across much of its surface. The driver's-side mirror is torn from its normal position, body panels are dented and scraped, and portions of the front bumper and trim are missing.
The sliding cargo door remains open in one photograph, revealing boxes, bins and supplies still inside.
A large piece of the van — one of its doors — lies by itself in the grass some distance away.
Owens was arrested Friday. The recommended charges listed by police could change when prosecutors formally file the case.
Of the recommended charges, aggravated assault and battery and theft of $1,000 or more are felonies, each punishable by up to 10 years in prison. Reckless driving and failure to fulfill the required duty after striking unattended property are misdemeanors. A first conviction for the latter offense carries a maximum penalty of 20 days in jail, a $200 fine, or both.
Kolby Fedore can be reached at kolby@cowboystatedaily.com.
