The Wyoming Supreme Court held that digital penetration and use of a sexual device qualify as explicit sexual conduct under the child-exploitation statute and upheld an aggregate 21-to-30-year sentence.
The Wyoming Supreme Court upheld a bicycle stop based on an objectively reasonable factual mistake and refused to review issues not specifically preserved in a conditional plea.
Wyoming’s high court held that vulnerable-adult exploitation spanning two counties could be tried in Converse County and affirmed restitution for clothing made inaccessible by the crime.
The Wyoming Supreme Court affirmed Steven Randall Marler’s convictions on eight counts of sexual abuse and six counts of battery against children in his care, holding that the district court properly admitted broad Rule 404(b) “other acts” evidence of grooming rituals and a fear-based disciplinary regimen, that a victim’s collateral lie to a jail guard was excludable without violating the Confrontation Clause, that a rule-of-completeness claim was waived by failure to make an offer of proof, and that brief prosecutorial questioning about a victim’s father’s suicide did not constitute plain-error misconduct.
The Wyoming Supreme Court affirmed a probation revocation, holding that the district court erred by determining willfulness during the adjudicatory phase rather than the dispositional phase—a clear violation of Wyoming’s two-part revocation framework—but that the error did not constitute plain error because Smith suffered no material prejudice: he presented his willfulness arguments before the court’s finding and again at disposition, and an independently established, uncontested violation independently supported revocation.
The Wyoming Supreme Court unanimously affirmed the denial of Christopher Campbell’s motion to suppress evidence seized from his Evanston residence, holding that Deputy Barker’s search-warrant affidavit established probable cause under the totality-of-circumstances test. The court rejected Campbell’s paragraph-by-paragraph critique of the affidavit as methodologically improper: Wyoming law requires courts to evaluate the affidavit as a whole, not in piecemeal fashion. Viewed in its totality, a convergence of circumstantial links—a matching U-Haul seen at the residence, receipts tying an associate to both the truck and the address, Arizona connections shared by the stolen vehicle and the occupants, and matching tire tracks—established the required nexus between the evidence sought and the place to be searched.
The Wyoming Supreme Court reversed and remanded a criminal case in which the district court ordered the defendant to sell a vehicle and deposit the proceeds as a condition of maintaining his public defender appointment. The court held that the subsequent guilty plea did not waive the challenge because the issue was unrelated to guilt or conviction, and that the district court exceeded its statutory authority under Wyoming’s public defender reimbursement statute by compelling a pre-sentencing forced asset liquidation.
The Wyoming Supreme Court reversed a contempt order against the Wyoming Boys’ School for refusing to admit an alleged delinquent juvenile before adjudication. The court held that Wyoming law expressly prohibits pre-adjudication placement at WBS, which is a reformatory for adjudicated delinquents — not a juvenile detention facility — and that the juvenile court abused its discretion by ordering such placement. All three exceptions to the mootness doctrine applied, allowing the court to reach the merits despite the case having been resolved below.
The Wyoming Supreme Court unanimously affirmed consecutive sentences for a former Casper police officer who pleaded guilty to five counts of aggravated assault and battery following a prolonged armed standoff, holding that a plea agreement capping the State’s “sentencing argument” was a non-binding recommendation under W.R.Cr.P. 11(e)(1)(B)—not a stipulated sentence under 11(e)(1)(C)—and that Wyoming district courts need not make specific findings when deviating from a sentencing recommendation.
The Wyoming Supreme Court affirmed a district court’s denial of a convicted shoplifter’s Rule 41(g) motion for return of seized property, holding that the State overcame the post-conviction presumption favoring return by presenting credible testimony that the items were likely stolen—and clarifying Wyoming’s burden-shifting framework for such motions for the first time in the context of alleged stolen property.
The Wyoming Supreme Court affirmed the denial of self-defense immunity to a man who shot and killed his neighbor during a dispute over property boundaries, holding that Wyoming’s castle doctrine presumptions under § 6-2-602(b) and (d) do not extend to outdoor areas such as driveways, and that a defendant’s subjective belief that an intruder was about to enter his home — without objective corroboration — is insufficient to trigger the statutory presumptions.