Wyoming

Judge Tosses Wyoming Woman’s Claim Employer Tried To Have Her Committed

Published

1 week ago

April 24, 2024

Judge Tosses Wyoming Woman’s Claim Employer Tried To Have Her Committed

A federal judge has dismissed the lawsuit of a Wyoming woman who claimed her employer, a hospital in Weston County, tried to have her involuntarily committed for trying to expose bad financial practices.

Amanda McDade didn’t specifically warn Weston County Health Services, a governmental entity, of her plan to sue it, though Wyoming law generally requires doing so before suing the government, U.S. District Court Judge Scott Skavdahl wrote Friday in an order dismissing McDade’s lawsuit against the hospital.

McDade’s other claims that the hospital discriminated against her as a whistleblower and as a person with a disability also failed, because McDade did not back the former with relevant law or the latter allegation with evidence, Skavdahl’s order says.

“To the extent Plaintiff asserts Defendant’s alleged actions are ‘obviously’ illegal, the Court disagrees with such a conclusory statement,” wrote Skavdahl.

What She Alleged

McDade had alleged in a December civil complaint that while working as a human resources generalist for Weston County Health Services, she noticed money mismanagement.

She reported her concerns to the hospital board president and was allegedly asked to alter the records to conceal the wrongdoing. After that, a hostile work environment festered around her, her lawsuit says.

McDade’s own doctor, Dr. Sara Thurgood, approached her Oct. 14, 2021, saying she wanted to address concerns she’d heard from others, and that their shared employer was worried about McDade and considering having her involuntarily committed.

In a December interview with Cowboy State Daily, Thurgood acknowledged that she broached others’ concerns with McDade, but said hospital authorities tried to use her, Thurgood, as a “pawn” against McDade.

Rattled, McDade fled the office and later quit her job.

You Gotta Warn The Government

The Wyoming Governmental Claims Act is the mechanism by which people can sue the state government and its entities, generally. When plaintiffs don’t comply with it, courts dismiss their cases.

McDade said she gave the hospital notice of her claims against it Dec. 5, 2023, which the hospital denied. Either way, that falls after the two-year deadline for filing those notices prior to suing governmental entities.

McDade argued back that documents and evidence she gave to the Department of Labor Standards should have been enough notification for the hospital.

Skavdahl characterized that as unrealistic.

“(The hospital) would be put in the untenable position of combing through documents in search of potential claims and then reading McDade’s mind to determine which of those claims she may want to pursue,” the judge wrote.

Wrong Law

McDade alleged she was discriminated against for being a whistleblower regarding the hospital’s alleged misdeeds.

She cited a state law forbidding Wyoming licensed health care facilities from retaliating against whistleblowers who report wrongdoing to the appropriate division of the state Department of Health.

The law doesn’t provide a mechanism to launch a lawsuit, however, Skavdahl wrote.

This Is Not The KKK

McDade’s lawsuit had invoked a federal law, 42 USC 1985 (3), a portion of the Ku Klux Klan Act banning class-based hostility. The act was written to protect African Americans and people who championed their cause from Ku Klux Klan’s violent, post-Civil War discriminatory conspiracies.

Skavdahl didn’t effectively narrow the act’s use in Wyoming to protecting African Americans, but he pointed to the U.S. Supreme Court’s frequent questioning of whether the KKK Act could ever fall outside that goal.

In either case, it can’t be used to protect someone on the basis of having a disability, which was the use to which McDade’s lawsuit attempted to apply it, the judge wrote.

But It Is Familiar

The KKK law is familiar: Former Campbell County Library Director Terri Lesley is invoking that same federal statute in her lawsuit against the Bennett family, whom she’s accusing of conspiring against her and perpetuating injurious falsehoods about her.

Lesley’s conflict with the Bennetts stems from the Bennetts raising alarms about sexually graphic books in the library system, followed by a turnover on the library board and the board firing Lesley.

The Bennetts raised some of the same concerns about Lesley’s use of that statute as Skavdahl raised about McDade’s.

What Disability?

McDade accused the hospital of not accommodating her disability.

Skavdahl’s response to that was essentially, what disability?

McDade alleged that she had a health diagnosis that her employer was aware of, but didn’t name her alleged disability in her complaint.

Other claims, such as McDade’s allegation the hospital created a hostile work environment, also failed due to McDade invoking a legal application that didn’t match her actual claims, and because of McDade’s description of one traumatizing day not being enough evidence of a hostile work environment, the order says.

Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.

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Wyoming

Rooted in Wyoming holding work day

Published

6 hours ago

May 4, 2024

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Wyoming

Don Day Wyoming Weather Forecast: Saturday, May 4, 2024

Published

13 hours ago

May 3, 2024

Press Room

Don Day Wyoming Weather Forecast: Saturday, May 4, 2024

Sunny and warmer in Wyoming on Saturday. Breezy in some areas. Most highs in the 60s and lows in the 30s and 40s.

Central:

Casper: Watch for patchy fog before 10 a.m., otherwise look for it to be sunny today with a high near 65 and mostly clear and breezy overnight with a low near 39 and wind gusts as high as 24 mph.

Lander: It should be sunny today with a high near 61 and clouds should increase overnight with a low near 39.

Shoshoni: Look for patchy fog before 10 a.m., otherwise it should be sunny today with a high near 70 and it should be breezy overnight with increasing clouds, a low near 41 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph.

Southwest:

Evanston: Expect it to be sunny today with a high near 63 and wind from 6-16 mph. Overnight it should be mostly cloudy with a low near 42.

Green River: It should be sunny and breezy today with a high near 69 and wind gusts as high as 29 mph. Overnight clouds should increase and it should be breezy with a low near 47 and wind gusts as high as 28 mph.

Kemmerer: Look for it to be sunny and breezy today with a high near 65 and wind gusts as high as 24 mph. Clouds should increase and it should be breezy overnight with a low near 42 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph.

Western Wyoming:

Pinedale: Look for it to be sunny today with a high near 58 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph. Overnight it should be breezy and clouds should increase with a slight chance of rain, a low near 37 and wind gusts as high as 21 mph.

Afton: Expect it to be sunny and breezy today with a high near 64 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph. Overnight it should be breezy and clouds should increase with a chance of rain after 1 a.m., a low near 39 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph.

La Barge: It should be sunny and breezy today with a high near 63 and wind gusts as high as 21 mph. Overnight it should be breezy and clouds should increase with a low near 41 and wind gusts as high as 24 mph.

Northwest:

Dubois: It should be sunny and breezy today with a high near 52 and wind gusts as high as 22 mph. Overnight it should be breezy and clouds should increase with a slight chance of rain, a low near 35 and wind gusts as high as 22 mph.

Jackson: Expect it to be sunny and breezy today with a high near 63 and wind gusts as high as 22 mph. It should be mostly cloudy and breezy overnight with a chance of rain, a low near 36 and wind gusts as high as 24 mph.

Old Faithful in Yellowstone National Park: Look for it to be sunny today with a high near 56 and mostly cloudy and breezy overnight with a chance of rain and snow, a low near 31 and wind gusts as high as 21 mph.

Bighorn Basin:

Thermopolis: It should be sunny and breezy today with a high near 68 and wind gusts as high as 24 mph. Overnight it should be partly cloudy with a low near 42.

Cody: Look for it to be sunny and breezy today with a high near 65 and wind gusts as high as 21 mph. Overnight it should be mostly cloudy with a low near 41 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph.

Lovell: Expect it to be sunny and breezy today with a high near 69 and wind gusts as high as 28 mph. Overnight it should be partly cloudy and breezy with a low near 43 and wind gusts as high as 31 mph.

North Central:

Buffalo: Look for it to be sunny and breezy today with a high near 63 and wind gusts as high as 32 mph. Overnight it should be mostly clear and breezy with a low near 44 and wind gusts as high as 32 mph.

Sheridan: Expect it to be sunny today with a high near 67 and wind from 11-16 mph in the afternoon. It should be mostly clear overnight with a low near 39 and wind from 9-16 mph.

Story: It should be sunny today with a high near 62 and wind from 13-18 mph in the afternoon. Overnight it should be mostly clear with a low near 41 and wind from 14-17 mph.

Northeast:

Gillette: Expect it to be sunny today with a high near 63 and winds could gust as high as 22 mph. Overnight it should be mostly clear and breezy with a low near 41 and wind gusts as high as 37 mph.

Newcastle: Look for it to be sunny today with a high near 59 and wind gusts as high as 17 mph. Overnight it should be mostly clear with a low near 41 and wind gusts as high as 26 mph.

Hulett: It should be sunny today with a high near 62 and mostly clear overnight with a low near 43 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph.

Eastern Plains:

Torrington: It should be sunny today with a high near 65 and mostly clear and breezy overnight with a low near 39 and wind from 15-20 mph.

Lusk: Look for it to be sunny today with a high near 60 and mostly clear and breezy overnight with a low near 38 and wind gusts as high as 35 mph.

Guernsey: Expect it to be sunny today with a high near 66 and mostly clear and breezy overnight with a low near 41 and wind gusts as high as 30 mph.

Southeast:

Cheyenne: It should be sunny and breezy today with a high near 58 and wind from 15-20 mph in the afternoon. Overnight it should be mostly clear and breezy with a low near 37 and wind from 15-20 mph.

Laramie: Expect it to be sunny today with a high near 58 and mostly clear and breezy overnight with a low near 36 and wind gusts as high as 30 mph.

Pine Bluffs: Look for it to be sunny today with a high near 61 and mostly clear and breezy overnight with a low near 37 and wind from 15-25 mph.

South Central:

Rawlins: Look for it to be sunny today with a high near 63 and mostly clear overnight with a low near 39.

Saratoga: Expect it to be sunny today with a high near 63 and mostly clear overnight with a low near 38.

Wamsutter: It should be sunny and breezy today with a high near 64 and wind gusts as high as 22 mph. Overnight it should be breezy and clouds should increase with a low near 40 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph.

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Wyoming

Wyoming Man Says He Tried To Gun Down Relatives Because He Was ‘Pretty Mad’

Published

20 hours ago

May 3, 2024

Press Room

Wyoming Man Says He Tried To Gun Down Relatives Because He Was ‘Pretty Mad’

RAWLINS — A 74-year-old Rawlins, Wyoming, man confessed Friday to shooting his nephew and his nephew’s wife in an attempt to kill them both last year because he was “pretty mad.”

Melvin Bagley sat hunched in a grey and white jail-issue jumpsuit, turned away from the third-floor windows of the Carbon County District Court room at his change of plea hearing.

Barely visible outside, the tops of the spruce trees leaned away from the wind.

Bagley’s nephew Marvin “JR” Bagley and Marvin’s wife Stephanie sat in the second bench on the prosecutor’s side of the courtroom. They’re generally healed up from the bullets that tore through Marvin’s face and hand, and through Stephanie’s shoulder, on Sept. 3, 2023, the couple said.

On that date, Melvin Bagley pulled his truck up next to theirs on the couple’s ranch near Bairoil and opened fire. Melvin Bagley had been struggling with dementia for a long while, and Marvin and Stephanie had struggled to rein in his paranoid outbursts, Stephanie told Cowboy State Daily earlier in this case.

During the melee, Marvin found a .22 revolver he keeps in his truck and fired back. Then he sped off in his own truck and made a snap decision to break through his gate to escape. Later, he flagged down a Wyoming Highway Patrol trooper by waving his bloody hand out the window.

What The Plea Agreement Says

“I’m here to plead,” said Melvin Bagley on Friday when Carbon County District Court Judge Dawnessa Snyder asked him if he understood why he was there.

He wore headphones so he could hear the judge. Squinting, he spoke softly with a Southern accent and answered most of the judge’s questions with a nod and a truncated “yeh.”

Melvin Bagley’s plea agreement says he will have his other charges — aggravated assault and reckless driving — dropped in exchange for pleading guilty to two counts of attempted second-degree murder. His defense attorney Sergio Lemus and prosecutor Carbon County Attorney Sarah Chavez Harkins have agreed upon a sentence of 20-40 years in prison, Snyder said.

The judge doesn’t have to accept the plea agreement, she warned, adding that judges nevertheless regard those recommendations with respect.

Melvin Bagley may also have to pay restitution.

Marvin, left, and Stephanie Bagley (Courtesy Photos)

The Confession

“Tell me what happened,” said Snyder.

“Well, I shot my nephew and his wife,” said Melvin Bagley, leaning forward toward the microphone on the defense table.

Snyder asked if he intended to kill them.

“At the time I was pretty mad,” Melvin Bagley said.

Harkins elaborated, saying Melvin Bagley suspected his family members of stealing money from him, a fact that was never proven, and he went to them and shot them both. Later, he told investigators he was trying to kill them, said the prosecutor.

Both Lemus and Snyder were satisfied that this evidence would support Bagley’s pleas, and Snyder accepted both guilty pleas and entered convictions against him.

Melvin Bagley will be sentenced in about 90 days, after a probation agent conducts a report on his history and character, and at that time Snyder will decide if she’s going to accept Bagley’s plea agreement, the judge said.

Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.

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