Wyoming News Briefs

Attempted murder charge reduced, man faces up to 10 years in prison

GILLETTE (WNE) — The attempted second-degree murder charge against a man accused of stabbing and swinging a knife multiple times at his daughter’s boyfriend last summer has been reduced to aggravated assault and battery.

He now faces up to ten years in prison and will argue for probation at his sentencing hearing.

Umar Farooq, 48, pleaded guilty Feb. 13 to aggravated assault and battery. In a plea deal with prosecutors, the charge was reduced from an original attempted second-degree murder charge.

Farooq’s wife told police at the time of the incident that he allegedly was angry that his daughter had planned to move in with her boyfriend, a registered sex offender, according to the affidavit of probable cause filed in the case.

The 24-year-old boyfriend, Ian Brokenleg, was convicted of second-degree sexual abuse of a minor and sentenced in January 2021. Brokenleg was accused of having sex with a girl between the ages of 13 and 15 when he was 17 years or older, according to court documents.

Police became involved in the incident at about 4:45 p.m. Aug. 26 when Brokenleg arrived at the police department with blood on his hands and clothes, claiming that his girlfriend’s father tried stabbing him.

Brokenleg said he had been dating Farooq’s daughter for about two months. She apparently had planned to move in with him Thursday, the day her father allegedly stabbed him.

Casper snowmobiler dies on Togwotee Pass

JACKSON (WNE) — Joshua Holder, a 42-year-old Casper man, was killed Sunday afternoon on Togwotee Pass after his sledding partner found him pinned under his snowmobile in the snow.

It’s not clear how the sled ended up on top of him, said Matt Hansen, the Teton County Search and Rescue Foundation’s communications director. Holder and his partner separated shortly before the accident. It’s also not clear how, exactly, Holder died.

Teton County Coroner Brent Blue said his office hadn’t determined a cause of death by press time Monday.

The accident was also not avalanche-related. Hansen said first responders didn’t see a debris path or any other signs of instability in the area where Holder was found. They did, however, find deep, sugary, unconsolidated snow beneath his snowmobile.

Teton County Search and Rescue “has responded to accidents like this before where snowmobilers get upside down underneath their snowmobile,” Hansen said. “Sometimes they make it out, sometimes they don’t.”

Before the most recent accident, Holder and his partner lost sight of one another while riding near the X Trail, a spur of the larger Continental Divide Trail on Togwotee Pass. When Holder’s partner found him pinned under his snowmobile, he sent out an SOS alert on a satellite device which mobilized Search and Rescue into the field with snowmobiles and a helicopter.

They were joined by the Teton County Sheriff’s Office and Jackson Hole Fire/EMS.

On scene, responders determined Holder was dead and that his death had not been caused by a slide.

Hansen said it’s critical to keep “an eye on each other,” and make sure “you know where your partner is.”

Cam-plex turns corner on $7 million hail damage claim from 2019

GILLETTE (WNE) — After a few years of working through an extensive and expensive insurance claim covering hail damage caused by a 2019 storm, Cam-plex is eyeing the end of the drawn-out repair process.

After a stalemate over certain claims and shoddy work done to others, a number of repairs to the Heritage Center, Energy Hall, East and Central Pavilions and more that were stuck in limbo have been approved by the insurer and will be underway soon.

Last week, Campbell County Public Land Board members received an update from Van Ewing Construction, the construction manager at risk, or CMAR, hired for the job in spring 2020.

The hail claim estimate in 2020 came in at $6.7 million, in addition to a $500,000 deductible, and affected a number of facilities on the Cam-plex campus.

“All of Cam-plex is here in one spot,” said Aaron Lyles, Cam-plex executive director. “When you have this size of storm across the city, sometimes it’s not so bad because that city infrastructure is spread out all over the place and it might not really get hammered. Specifically, we got hit hard here at Cam-plex, which is why the claim is the scale that it was.”

One set of repairs recently approved involves the Heritage Center, of which more than $600,000 in work was OK’d, Lyles said.

A claim mitigation expert had rejected the quotes for many of the repairs, slowing down the process and increasing the cost of the repairs as prices rose over time, Lyles said. Now the backlog of claims has been resolved, with the outstanding repairs set in motion.

Gordon to hold second summit on mental health

CHEYENNE (WNE) — Gov. Mark Gordon has announced the second Governor’s Mental Health Summit, which will take place April 18 in Casper.

In October 2022, Gordon was joined by legislative and judicial branch leadership at a mental health summit in Casper that was focused on the impacts of early trauma and the importance of leadership roles in developing solutions for Wyoming’s mental health challenges.

“After the success of last fall’s mental health summit, I look forward to continuing the conversation and further engaging Wyoming communities on this important issue,” Gordon said.

Registration for the Second Governor’s Mental Health Summit is available on the Governor’s Mental Health website, sites.google.com/wyo.gov/governors-mental-health-summit/home. The summit will be livestreamed for those who are not able to secure a ticket for the in-person event.

Delta not returning to Yellowstone Regional Airport this year

CODY (WNE) — Flights from Cody to Salt Lake City via Delta and SkyWest Airlines are not likely to return in the summer of 2023.

However, Yellowstone Regional Airport Director Aaron Buck said he is hopeful he can bring the flights back in 2024 and beyond, and said he will continue to work with Delta and SkyWest on an agreement.

“We understand that the flight from here to Salt Lake City is an important flight for our community, and we are actively looking for a solution,” he said.

Buck said he is also considering a pair of projects that could help bring Delta — as well as new airline service — to Cody in the future.

Buck said Delta’s return to the airport hinged on the approval of its Part 135 application with the Federal Aviation Administration. The application would allow the airline to fly jets with 30 seats, rather than 50, he said. This, in turn, would allow them to employ pilots with fewer hours of flying experience.

But, as of March 8, the FAA still had not ruled on the application, Buck said

“Even if the FAA ultimately says yes, I’m worried we won’t have the time needed to sign the agreement, advertise the flights and actually have them be successful this summer,” he said. “So I think the timing prevents us from proceeding with that agreement, at least for this year.”

In Cody, Delta ran flights one to two times daily from early May to early October in 2021 and made up between 18% and 36% of the airport’s total flights, according to previous Enterprise reporting. In 2021, Delta Connection accounted for 5363 enplanements.

Laramie County man charged with 2017 Colo. murder

CHEYENNE (WNE) — A Laramie County man was arrested Thursday on a felony first-degree murder warrant in connection with the May, 2017 death of a Burns man in Weld County, Colorado.

Mark Dean Switzer, 71, of County Road 206 in Carpenter was taken into custody by Laramie County sheriff ’s deputies at 3:23 p.m. at the Cheyenne Veterans Affairs Medical Center on Pershing Boulevard. 

According to the Weld County Sheriff ’s Office, on May 18, 2017, deputies responded to the intersection of Weld County Road 136 and WCR 77, west of Hereford, Colorado, for a report of a possible fatal traffic accident. Initial reports were that the driver of an 18-wheel semi-truck was working on the truck when it unexpectedly moved and he was run over.

However, it was later determined that Nathan T. Combs II, 49, of Burns had died from apparent gunshot wounds that were not self-inflicted.

On Friday, WCSO posted on its Facebook page that its detectives conducted interviews, gathered evidence and completed other investigative work that resulted in a search warrant for Switzer’s Carpenter home.

“Several firearms and ammunition were collected during the execution of the search warrant, which were sent for testing and analysis at the Northern Forensic Regional Laboratory, the FBI, and the Colorado Bureau of Investigation,” the Facebook post said.

Although Switzer is in custody, the investigation is ongoing, WCSO officials said.

Anyone with information about the case can call the Weld County Sheriff ’s Office at 970-356-4015 or Northern Colorado Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222TIPS.Tips can also be submitted through the Crime Stoppers website at crimeshurt.com.

Hotels begin to fill as businesses prepare for Camporee in 2024

GILLETTE (WNE)— Some local hotels are already booked as entities in Gillette continue to prepare for the International Pathfinder Camporee, which makes its way to Gillette in August 2024.

At least four Gillette hotels are already booked for the event that takes place Aug. 5-11 next year, local hotel managers said during a lodging association meeting Thursday.

After it was announced that Gillette would host the event in 2024, Jessica Seders, executive director of Gillette Main Street, said she and others reached out to organizers in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, for tips on how to prepare for the population of visitors that will more than double Gillette’s population come next summer.

Oshkosh had previously housed the Camporee every five years since 1999.

Of the more than 50,000 visitors, more than 100 countries will be represented, Seders said. Many of the suggestions organizers in Oshkosh gave dealt with the lodging industry but also for local entities interacting with language or cultural barriers on a daily basis.

For hotels and restaurants, Seders said that keeping food orders in mind will be important.

“The majority of visitors, not all of them, but the majority are vegetarian and sometimes even vegan,” Seders said. “Making sure that the breakfast options for them have a lot of vegetarian or vegan options, which for us is unusual, if we can accommodate that for them they would really appreciate that.”

Seders said extra cleaning will also be required because in many of the countries, toilet paper isn’t able to be flushed because of poor sewer systems. Instead, the paper is thrown away, which will increase the amount of time needed to take out trash at places throughout the city and county.

Gillette Avenue now on National Register as historic downtown district

GILLETTE (WNE) — It’s official: downtown Gillette is historic.

Thanks to years of work by the Gillette Historic Preservation Commission, Gillette Avenue from First Street to Seventh Street was recently accepted to the National Register of Historic Places as a historic downtown district.

“For most of our 132 years, downtown Gillette was the center of life,” said Robert Henning, member of the commission and the director of the Rockpile Museum. “All the businesses, the schools, the churches, everything was right downtown.”

The historic downtown has remained the heart of the community over the decades, Henning said, with the growth of Gillette spreading out from that area.

The designation does not change anything with the ownership of buildings within that district, according to author Mary Kelley, who is a member of the Campbell County Historical Society and Gillette Historic Preservation. 

There will be a sign put up along Interstate 90 advertising the downtown’s historic designation.

“It’s very much honorary recognition,” Kelley said. “It’s good for tourism. There are people who travel to see historic districts and buildings.” 

Agencies investigating pronghorn die-off south of Pinedale

PINEDALE (WNE) — The Wyoming Game and Fish Department and the Wyoming State Veterinary Laboratory are collaboratively investigating a “rare disease outbreak” in pronghorn in western Wyoming. 

About 200 pronghorn antelope have died since mid-February, mainly near the southern end of the Mesa south of Pinedale. 

Preliminary lab results identify Mycoplasma bovis as the pathogen responsible for the mortalities. According to Game and Fish, Mycoplasma bovis should not be confused with Mycobacterium bovis, which causes tuberculosis in cattle; the two unrelated bacteria cause very different diseases. 

In a March 8 release, Game and Fish explained, “The source of infection of the M. bovis and the ability to predict the duration and the geographic distribution of this outbreak in pronghorn is unknown at this time.” 

“While reported M. bovis outbreaks causing mortality in wildlife are rare, this is not the first occurrence of M. Bovis being linked to pronghorn mortalities in Wyoming,” said Game and Fish Wildlife Disease Specialist Hank Edwards. 

The first reported cases of pneumonia in pronghorn occurred during the winters of 2019 and 2020 near Gillette, involving at least 460 animals. 

Those outbreaks started at a similar time in mid-February and then tapered down by the beginning of April. 

To date, this pathogen has not been shown to affect domestic pets such as horses, dogs or cats and is not considered a human health risk. 

Local Game and Fish personnel advise that they are periodically removing carcasses and euthanizing dying pronghorn in relatively accessible areas when disturbance to other healthy wintering pronghorn is minimal to help reduce the prevalence of this pathogen on the landscape. 

Game and Fish continues to monitor for this disease across the state.