Free Republic

A Minnesota man says he was stunned to learn a stranger spent years building a life in Wyoming allegedly using his name — earning hundreds of thousands of dollars, fathering a child and leaving him to sort out the financial fallout with the IRS and owing child support. Now, a Gillette welding worker is facing four felony identity theft charges after investigators say he used another man's name and Social Security number to obtain employment and official documents. Jose Alfredo Guevara-Reyes, 45, made his initial appearance in Campbell County Circuit Court last week after being charged with four counts of...

The transgender Laramie resident who staged a protest at the state Capitol last summer of Wyoming’s new cross-sex access ban for public restrooms is now waging a self-defense argument in a felony aggravated assault case. Rihanna Kelver, 26, made headlines last summer for using the women’s bathroom in the Wyoming Capitol when a new state law activated banning the practice. The ban doesn’t allow for penalties against a transgender person using the women’s bathroom, but allows females aggrieved by that event to sue the state for letting it happen. About two months later, Kelver was involved in an altercation with...

For 30 years, the Miner's Delight restaurant in remote Atlantic City, Wyoming, was the place to go in the Cowboy State. Started by an advertising executive from New York, the upscale French cuisine attracted diners from hundreds of miles away. In the early 1960s, the stress of being an advertising executive in New York was taking a toll on Paul Newman’s health. Calling himself Paul Newman “The Original” — he’s not the Oscar-winning actor — he was on a fishing holiday in Wyoming when he told his wife Georgina (Gina) that instead of dying on the streets of New York,...

Body camera and dash camera video released Thursday shows the chaotic end of a high-speed Interstate 80 pursuit that topped 120 mph that authorities say ended with a wanted Wyoming woman getting struck by her own moving vehicle as she bailed out of it. The Albany County Sheriff's Office reports chase began around 6:25 p.m. Saturday after a sheriff’s sergeant spotted a stolen vehicle traveling eastbound near mile marker 323 on Interstate 80 in Albany County. Authorities identified the driver as Sarah Grazin, 45, who deputies said was tied to multiple felony warrants out of Sublette County. Law enforcement alerts...

The Maverik gas station in Montrose, Colorado, can’t sell any diesel after someone dumped an RV’s waste tank into the station’s underground diesel supply. The incident happened sometime on Monday, and a woman who answered the phone at the Montrose Maverik station on Tuesday confirmed that someone had dumped an RV waste tank into its underground diesel storage tank. She said the pumps “are shut down right now,” that the store was busy, and hung up. Cowboy State Daily hasn’t been able to confirm the status of the situation at the Montrose Maverik since that call. Subsequent calls weren’t answered....

The Cheyenne Police Department says a man living under a bridge in a city park armed himself with a 5-foot stick, clubbed a police K-9, and took multiple swings at four officers in waist-deep water. The bizarre showdown unfolded Friday near Martin Luther King Jr. Park, where officers were dispatched after getting reports of a man believed to be experiencing some sort of “psychosis." Police say city compliance workers were trying to clean beneath the bridge, but the man refused to leave the area. He identified himself as Casey Donavin Ragnarok Lothrar Ott, wrote Cheyenne Police Officer Noah Rodgers in...

An enemy bullet hit his leg as a Green Beret special forces operator in Vietnam, he was burned in a helicopter crash training to be a pilot, and on a May day in 1967 was shot seven times times while flying a UH-1 Huey on a mission. He kept flying and completed the mission. But Jerome “Jerry” Montoya, 86, of Cheyenne would go on to take the controls of a chopper again and finish a 25-year career with the U.S. Army. His scars leave him with no regrets. “Do the thing that you are good at and do the thing...

A rescued miniature donkey named Miguel has become one of Wyoming’s most in-demand wedding bartenders by wandering through cocktail hours with beer strapped to his sides. “It’s a great conversation starter,” said the beer burro business owner At first glance, it looks like something out of an old Western postcard gone slightly off the rails. It’s a miniature donkey weaving through a Wyoming wedding crowd with baskets of ice-cold beer strapped to its sides while guests in boots and cocktail dresses scramble to take photos with it. Beer burros like Miguel, a rescued miniature donkey, are becoming increasingly popular around...

CHEYENNE — Nearly 120 commercial truck drivers have been caught and turned over to federal authorities in the five months the Laramie County Sheriff’s Office has been running its Truck Around and Find Out enforcement, including 46 during its latest operation last week. Truck Around is not just about commercial drivers or catching illegal immigrants, said Sheriff Brian Kozak about the focused traffic missions, which usually last three days. “We like to say anyone who’s driving unsafe around trucks or truck drivers who are unsafe,” he said. “We’re looking out for the legal truck drivers who are doing it right....

Will Yellowstone erupt or are we blowing things out of proportion? We may have underestimated Yellowstone’s potential to blow its stack in the future. Chinese scientists have made a disconcerting find regarding the mechanism behind the caldera’s eruption, sparking concerns that it could belch lava sooner than we’d hoped, per an explosive study in the journal Science. A study on the mechanism behind the Yellowstone supervolcano’s magma flow has sparked concerns that an eruption could be on the horizon. Contrary to prior scholarship, which suggested that the magma originates in large deep chambers, the new study suggests that it could...

The Wyoming Supreme Court has struck down two pro-life laws banning most abortions, allowing the killing of unborn babies to continue. In a 4-1 ruling on Tuesday, the court declared the bans unconstitutional, citing a 2012 state constitutional amendment that protects the right to make health care decisions, despite the fact that killing babies in abortions is a denial of health care for unborn babies. The laws, passed in 2023, included a comprehensive prohibition on abortion with exceptions for rape, incest or to save the mother’s life, and the nation’s first explicit ban on abortion pills. “A woman has a...

A Wyoming lawmaker arrested for drunken driving told cops he boozed it up behind the wheel to cope with “anxiety,” authorities said. Bill Allemand, a Republican in the Wyoming House of Representatives, was pulled over in Buffalo when officers spotted him driving erratically around 12:30 p.m. Sunday, according to a police report obtained by WyoFile. An open can of beer was found in the front-seat cupholder next to Allemand, while four unopened cans were found in the passenger seat — and there was even a loaded handgun in the seat alongside him. “[Allemand] admitted that he drinks while driving for...

Rep. Harriet Hageman, a Republican, is running for Senate in Wyoming next year, seeking to replace retiring GOP Sen. Cynthia Lummis, who announced last week that she would not ​run for re-election. Trump quickly gave Hageman his "my Complete and Total Endorsement, writing in a Truth Social post hours after she launched her campaign that he knows Hageman well and she "is a TOTAL WINNER! Harriet has ALWAYS delivered for Wyoming, and will continue to do so in the United States Senate." Hageman, 63, was elected to be the state’s lone representative in Congress in 2022 after ousting then-Rep. Liz...

The girl Wyoming Highway Patrol troopers say they rescued from two kidnappers told her sister before the incident that she was being followed and that someone AirDropped to her a photo of a gun pointed at the house where she was staying, court documents say. The Wyoming Highway Patrol on Nov. 29 arrested two men who were traveling with a 16-year-old girl, on claims the two men were kidnapping her from her home in Wisconsin. They struggled with cellphone pings in the sparse state and resorted ultimately to scouring the state’s roadways until they found the girl, the agency said...

President Trump on Monday pardoned a trail runner who took a brief detour on a prohibited trail while attempting to break a record running up and down the tallest peak in the Teton Range of Wyoming. Michelino Sunseri, 33, ran up and down the 13,775-foot-tall Grand Teton peak on Sept. 2, 2024, in a record-shattering 2 hours, 50 minutes, 50 seconds. On his way down, Sunseri used a shortcut to avoid casual hikers, but going off-trail in a national park is prohibited due to concerns of erosion. Sunseri was convicted of a misdemeanor in September for taking the frowned-upon cut-through....

In what later became a public example of the Laramie County Sheriff’s Office’s new immigration enforcement powers, the agency arrested a pair of undocumented truck drivers Tuesday, one operating with a license that was suspended because of a DUI after the driver reportedly bypassed a Wyoming Port of Entry. That driver originated from Venezuela and was going 17 mph over the speed limit while evading inspection, Laramie Sheriff Brian Kozak said in a Tuesday social media video discussing the arrest. That driver had no commercial driver’s license and was driving on a Colorado operating license, which was suspended due to...

CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) — Investigators in Wyoming sought to identify two men they believe left a homemade bomb in front of the state Capitol, causing the building’s evacuation after a passerby found the object and brought it inside. The bomb, at a time of heightened political angst in the U.S., put the sleepy capital of the least-populated state on edge for awhile, with drones overhead and officers with bomb-sniffing dogs combing the Capitol grounds. But a day later, things appeared back to normal. No security was visible at the 135-year-old, sandstone building where visitors have always been able to more...

Wyoming and 10 other states’ claims that giant investment companies conspired to drive coal production down and drive prices up — increasing people’s energy costs — are at least plausible enough to keep a lawsuit alive, a judge has ruled. Wyoming filed suit in the U.S. District Court of Eastern Texas in late November against Blackrock Inc., State Street Corp. and Vanguard Group Inc. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton led the litigation. Alabama, Arkansas, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, West Virginia and Wyoming also signed the complaint. The states allege the three massive investment companies acquired substantial stockholdings in...

One of the most famous trial attorneys of the 20th century and a proud son of Wyoming, Gerry Spence, died overnight Wednesday, at the age of 96. Spence was a legend among the trial bar — especially for his civil practice and criminal defense work. =============================================================== One of the most famous trial attorneys of the 20th century and a proud son of Wyoming, Gerry Spence died overnight Wednesday in his Montecito, California, home at the age of 96, his family says. Spence was a legend among the trial bar, especially for his civil practice and criminal defense work. He was...

In a groundbreaking development, the United States has initiated the opening of a new rare earths mine for the first time in over seven decades. This historic project, situated in Wyoming, has the potential to transform the U.S. economy and bolster its national defense. The discovery was documented in a recent economic viability study published by an independent source, which estimates that the Brook Mine holds up to 1.7 million tons of rare earths and critical minerals, with a vast untapped area still to be explored. The mine is poised to significantly reduce America’s reliance on foreign sources of these...