Prosecutor Clears Cheyenne Cops Who Killed Man Who Took Wife Hostage

Laramie County’s top prosecutor has declined to prosecute the Cheyenne Police Department officers who shot and killed a man who had fired a gun near his wife’s head, taken her hostage and shot toward the officers, according to a law enforcement report released Tuesday to Cowboy State Daily.

Multiple Cheyenne Police Department officers shot toward Patrick Flores, 47, the night of March 8, 2024, in a Cheyenne town house during a tense hostage situation and standoff, says the report, which is the Wyoming Division of Investigation’s evidence and interview compilation from the incident.

Laramie County District Attorney Sylvia Hackl reviewed DCI’s gathered evidence and declined to charge any of the involved police officers with crimes. She characterized their response as fitting, that they tried to deescalate a hostage situation, but Flores kept brandishing his weapon, pointing it at his hostage and at police officers. 

When he fired, officers returned fire and fatally wounded Flores, according to a Nov. 13 summary letter Hackl sent to the Cheyenne police chief and sent Thursday to Cowboy State Daily.   

“The evidence demonstrates an appropriate police response to a volatile hostage situation,” wrote Hackl. “The officers’ actions do not warrant prosecution. I will close my file on this matter.”

The Cheyenne Police Department released body camera video of the incident days after it happened. 

‘You’re Gonna Die Tonight’

Flores and his wife had been married since 2021, the wife told DCI agents after the incident. 

He was chaotic and “on the run” from a warrant, and was a chronic drug user, she told investigators. She said they had relationship problems and when she confronted him over women's clothing she thought belonged to another woman, he said the clothes were his own and gave her a black eye for embarrassing him about it. 

She also struggled with addiction, the wife added.

The evening of March 8, Flores wanted the car keys and thought she’d hidden them, but she hadn’t, she said. He got angry, paranoid and increasingly aggressive, the report says.

He’d been brandishing a black handgun, threatening to kill her with it. The gun made her nervous since she’s a felon, the report relates from interviews.

Flores had been drinking all day and “may have dropped some acid,” the woman said, adding he was talking on the phone with someone prior about how he could sell them mushrooms and acid.

When Flores threatened to shoot his wife, she called a friend to come pick her up and get her out of the house. But when the friend arrived, she couldn’t get into the front door since Flores had taken the batteries out of the electronic door look, so no one could get in without the hard key, the wife told investigators.

Flores fired the pistol “very close” to his wife’s head, and the bullet went into the mattress, the wife recalled.

“I had black shit all over me,” she told a DCI agent. 

She smelled the gunpowder and heard the pop of the gun — two sensations she told the agent she’d always remember.

But beyond that, the report adds, “she was heart broken.”

The wife called her friend, who was still waiting outside, and screamed “Call 911!” before Flores snatched the phone out of her hand, the report says.

“You’re gonna die tonight bitch, you’re gonna die tonight!” Flores told her, reportedly. 

The report says he also put the pistol under his own chin and said, “We’re both dying tonight.”

In her DCI interview, the wife reflected this moment. Police arrived very quickly after the shot into the mattress sounded.

“I think if those cops wouldn’t have got (sic) there an (my friend) wouldn’t of (sic) been there, I felt like he would’ve killed me tonight,” she told DCI. “There’s not a doubt in  my mind the way he shot at those cops and me, he had no regard for anybody’s  life … he shot at those cops like it was nothing, nothing.”

The wife said she kept begging her husband to stop, and pressed one hand on his arm.

Donkey Kick

Several police officers arrived on scene.

Cheyenne Police Department Officer Reece Federer, who had been with the department for three years at that point, heard radio chatter indicating a man had “just shot a gun” in the Fishing Bridge area. He arrived fourth on scene, after Officers Audrey McGraw, Kilian Sweet and Colin Brengman. 

Federer grabbed his patrol rifle and posted himself outside, according to his interview with DCI.

But then he and others heard a woman screaming in agony and banging coming from the home, he said.

CPD Sgt. Zachary Johnson rushed back to his truck to get a sledgehammer to break through the door, Federer believed.

Federer heard gunshots, “And I knew they were gunshots,” he told DCI.

Johnson characterized it as “a lot of gunfire,” in his own DCI interview.

Sweet donkey-kicked the door open, and agents rushed into the home.  

“He’s going to kill me!” a woman’s voice screamed, according to the report.

Johnson was trying to calm Flores down. Federer was relieved that Flores, whom he mistakenly called “Jesse” at the time after mishearing something Flores’ wife said, was now mad at the police officers and not at his wife.

Federer noticed 9 mm casings on the landing of the stairs and believed Flores had been shooting at police officers, through the floor from the upstairs where he was then grabbing his wife’s arm and holding her behind him, the report says.

Brengman told DCI in his interview that while he and other officers were still outside the front door, he watched drywall dust rain from the living room ceiling as if bullets shot from the upstairs floor. 

The room filled with haze, he said.

Federer heard the sound of a slide racking on a pistol, the report relates from his interview.

“Don’t shoot him, don’t shoot him — I’m behind him,” the wife yelled. She later told agents she was nervous about Flores thinking she was siding with the cops and shooting her.

Federer wanted the suspect to release the hostage, he told DCI.

Flores demanded the officers throw their guns up the stairs. 

“I can’t do that,” said Johnson. “Let her go and we’ll leave. We’ll get out of here.”

Flores then demanded cigarettes. McGraw had some, and she retrieved them, but Johnson threw them up the stairs and into the wrong room.

That helped agents narrow down Flores’ position, the report indicates. But it also upset Flores.

Sweet had a pack of cigarettes in his car and sent an officer to fetch them.

Meanwhile, officers started “stacking up” in the home. Johnson, Sweet and Federer were “shoulder to shoulder.”

Safety Off

Federer flicked off his rifle’s safety switch, the report says.

At this point in his DCI interview, Federer became emotional but decided to press on anyway, the investigator noted.

“I see a right hand with a pistol. Black semiautomatic pistol, uh, extend out from the (upstairs) room,” he said. “The angle I had and, uh, it looks like he’s aiming where I think he thought we were, which was on the landing of the stairs.”

And the gun extended out, he added.

In Sweet’s interview, Sweet said he saw the gun flash twice, firing two rounds.

Federer saw Flores in a white tank top and pants, stomach exposed, and Federer shot.

“I couldn’t tell you how many times I shot,” he told the DCI agent.

Johnson also shot at the sight of the gun, as did Sweet. Johnson thought all these shots were simultaneous, “but he wasn’t sure,” the report says.

With Sweet maintaining cover on Flores, officers rushed upstairs together and found Flores lying on the floor, breathing in agony. Federer pointed his gun at Flores’ face, told him not to move, and put his foot on Flores’ right wrist so Flores’ wife could leave the scene without fear of being shot, the report says.

She did leave, and McGraw stayed with her outside, the report says.

Sweet said Flores had a “sucking chest wound.” 

Federer radioed out for a chest seal, and Brenman brought a “med kit” with extra equipment and first aid gear.

The fire department and ambulance crew both arrived to care for Flores, but he was pronounced dead 10 minutes after the ambulance crew arrived, the report says.

None of the officers were injured.

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