Lawsuit Roundup (June 2023)
A rundown of locally-filed or locally-significant lawsuits occurring across various courts. Some have been decided. Some are ongoing. All have an impact on life in Albany County.
Lawsuits are messy things. A plaintiff brings the suit, a defendant responds, both file motions, the judge reviews, additional parties join, dates are set and moved and moved again. The size of the docket rapidly balloons, even as the legal battle itself stretches across months and years.
To make matters worse, there’s no single place an invested individual can go to keep on top of the various lawsuits likely to affect their life. Suits filed in circuit or district court can be found at the nearest physical courthouse, Wyoming Supreme Court cases can be found online, and federal lawsuits can be found online as well, but only by registering at the relevant website.
And journalistic coverage of these lawsuits can be spotty. A case can fall off the radar if the journalist principally responsible for following it finds themself too busy with other assignments — or, as is increasingly common these days, leaves the profession. With lawsuits lasting years and newsrooms shrinking, it’s not impossible for a lawsuit to last longer than a journalist’s career.
And let’s be honest, you’ve got other things going on. Even if the city’s rental regulations directly impact your life (and they do if you’re a landlord, a renter, or you love someone who rents) you might not have the bandwidth or ability to catch every individual update published on a news site. And you certainly don’t have time to check each new filing at the courthouse.
All this said, your local news outlet, the Laramie Reporter, could do a better job keeping you informed. So here’s a rundown of various lawsuits, filed locally or affecting local life, and their current status. Some have run their course. Others are ongoing. But all of them have the potential to change the way your community operates.
Johnson v. Handley
Case: The racism lawsuit against a former Albany County Sheriff’s sergeant.
Jurisdiction: U.S. District Court of Wyoming
Status: Settled, though details of that settlement are not publicly known. Johnson, formerly a corporal with the Albany County Sheriff’s Office, accused his former supervisor of engaging in a ‘years-long racist tirade.’ The lawsuit alleged that then-Sergeant Christian Handley frequently used racial slurs to refer to Johnson, Black arrestees and other community members, made racist and graphic comments about having sex with Black women, and even once yelled at Johnson and his family in front of their house. Johnson also alleged Handley used his position of power and privilege within the sheriff’s office to oust Johnson — who was, at the time, the office’s only Black deputy. The case is notable for its frank discussion of Albany County’s “good ole boys” club.
Westenbroek, et al. v. Kappa Kappa Gamma Fraternity, et al.
Case: The lawsuit to remove a transgender student from a University of Wyoming sorority.
Jurisdiction: U.S. District Court of Wyoming
Status: Ongoing, and possibly headed to trial. Seven members of UW’s Kappa Kappa Gamma Sorority allege that another member, a transgender woman, engaged in creepy behavior such as leering at the plaintiffs and making inappropriate comments. They are asking that the transgender student be removed from the UW chapter and that the sorority ban transgender women from ever joining the organization. A judge ruled the plaintiffs could not remain anonymous, so six of the seven original plaintiffs refiled with their names. The defendants responded, asking the court to throw out the entire case. In separate motions filed on the same day, the national Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority and Artemis Langford, the transgender student at the heart of the case, argue the case is more of a press release than a sincere lawsuit. The sorority argues it has the right to accept whomever it wants into its organization and doesn’t have to adopt the exclusionary definition of “women” put forward by the plaintiffs. Langford argues there are no claims made specifically against her and that she was only included as a defendant so that plaintiffs could write a “winding” lawsuit mocking her appearance. The lawsuit comes amid a national right-wing push to ban transgender individuals from most areas of public life; Wyoming itself just passed its first anti-LGBTQ legislation in four decades to prohibit all transgender girls and women from competing in high school sports.
Schmidt v. University of Wyoming President, et al.
Case: The lawsuit challenging a preacher’s removal from campus.
Jurisdiction: U.S. District Court of Wyoming
Status: Ongoing, having been filed earlier this month. Laramie Faith Community Church Elder Todd Schmidt has tabled in the University of Wyoming student union for well over a decade. He regularly shares religious and conspiratorial messages ranging from anti-abortion and anti-atheist sentiments to young earth creationism and vaccine misinformation. In December, he displayed a banner targeting both transgender identity in general and a specific transgender student by name. UW authorities made Schmidt remove the name but allowed him to remain for the rest of the day. Following an outcry from students, alumni and other community members — that someone would be allowed to stay after targeting a student by name — the university banned Schmidt from tabling in the union for one year. He is not banned from campus and has returned since to preach outside the union. He also showed up at the transgender student’s sorority house and received a trespass warning from UW Police. Now, he is suing the university, claiming it infringed on his constitutional right to free speech. UW has yet to file a response.
Monaghan Farms v. The Board of County Commissioners of Albany County, et al.
Case: The lawsuit to halt the construction of the Rail Tie Wind Project.
Jurisdiction: Wyoming Supreme Court
Status: Decided, in favor of the Albany County Commissioners and ConnectGen, the company behind Rail Tie. The planned 26,000-acre wind farm will put up more than 100 turbines on state and private land in southern Albany County. For years, as ConnectGen sought and obtained permits and permissions from every level of government, local landowners fought back, saying the turbines would destroy the views from their property. The opposition group took out billboards, sent out fliers and mobbed public meetings, seeking to change wind development regulations or convince the commissioners to vote against the project. Ultimately, the three county commissioners approved the wind project unanimously. The opposition group’s last big attempt at stalling or stopping the project was this lawsuit, which argued the commissioners did not follow their own bylaws during the approval process. But Albany County District Court said the commissioners did everything by the book, so the landowners appealed to the Wyoming Supreme Court. The state’s high court agreed with the district court, upheld the lower court’s ruling, and decided in favor of the county and wind energy company. The last several years have seen an unprecedented push by energy companies to add wind farms across the county.
Johnson, et al. v. State of Wyoming, et al.
Case: The lawsuit challenging Wyoming’s surgical and chemical abortion bans.
Jurisdiction: Wyoming’s Ninth District Court
Status: Ongoing, with a bench trial set for April 2024. Wyoming passed two abortion bans during the 2023 Legislative Session, one prohibiting nearly all surgical abortions, another prohibiting all chemical or medication abortions. Both were immediately challenged in the Ninth District Court of Wyoming by abortion providers and abortion access activists. In their lawsuit against the state, the plaintiffs argue that the bans infringe on Wyomingites’ constitutional right to “make his or her own health decisions.” The state is countering that abortion is not healthcare and therefore is not protected by that constitutional language. The two bans had different start dates. The surgical ban was set to start immediately upon passage; the medication ban was set to start July 1. Judge Melissa Owens issued an immediate temporary restraining order on the surgical ban; that ban will remain in effect until the bench trial next year. Owens also issued a temporary restraining order on the medication ban this month, though it’s not clear how long that restraining order will last. So long as those orders are in place, both surgical and chemical abortions remain legal. The case will ultimately determine whether both or either kind of abortion will remain legal long-term in Wyoming.
Iron Bar Holdings, LLC v. Cape, et al.
Case: The “corner-crossing” lawsuit brought by a ranch owner against four hunters who briefly entered his airspace.
Jurisdiction: U.S. District Court of Wyoming
Status: Decided, in favor of the hunters. But there’s a high probability it will be appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th District. Fred Eshelman, the owner of the 22,000-acre Elk Mountain Ranch in Wyoming, sued four Missouri hunters who had “corner-crossed” from one parcel of public land to another, briefly entering the airspace above his privately-owned land. In May, Chief U.S. District Judge Scott Skavdahl ruled in favor of the hunters, finding that while the airspace does indeed belong to Eshelman, the private property owner’s rights are limited by the public’s right to access public land. There are some 8.3 million acres of “corner-locked” land in the United States — parcels that are in theory open to the public but are so thoroughly surrounded by private land that they are inaccessible without entering the airspace of that private land. This ruling unlocks those acres to the public. WyoFile notes the hunters’ lawyer is expecting Eshelman to appeal the court’s decision.
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Thanks for the awesome rundown.