Legal investigation continues as more districts receive similar threatening letters | Local News

Campbell County commissioners received an update on the incident at the courthouse in Gillette on Monday from Sheriff Scott Matheny, who also initiated discussions about protocols for providing information to the public in similar situations.

Matheny said a similar letter to the one reported in Gillette led to the evacuation of a courthouse in Natrona County. Since the Casper building received a letter similar to the one reported in Campbell County, Matheny said he sent a message to sheriffs and courthouses across the state to look for similar letters.

The notice allowed the Crook County Courthouse to avoid an evacuation Friday when it received the same letter.

“Because of the notice, they didn’t open it, they sealed it, they didn’t call in any hazmat, and the FBI came in and they didn’t have to shut anything down,” Matheny told commissioners.

Matheny said Tuesday that Platte County followed the same procedure when they received a similar-looking letter.

Although the FBI remained tight-lipped about its investigation, Matheny told detectives that there could be a potential suspect.

“I think you have a suspect,” Matheny said, “because there is a return address on the envelope and they were all the same.”

He said the name on the letter was that of a former Campbell County Detention Center inmate who lived in Campbell County years ago.

According to a press release from the Wyoming National Guard, the letter in Gillette contained a white powder indicating exposure to a harmful substance. On the dispatch scanner, the substance was reported as potential anthrax, which was debunked by testing by the Wyoming National Guard’s Civil Support Team, which determined the substance was not harmful.

Vikki Migoya, public affairs officer for the FBI’s Denver office, said in an email that the FBI is investigating the incident at the Campbell County Courthouse and would not provide further information about the investigation at this time.

At lunch Monday, Campbell County Commission Chairman Del Shelstad also talked about the protocol he would like to see put in place about how communications should be managed in situations like last week.

Although the Gillette Police Department and Campbell County Fire Department were the “concurrent incident commanders” on scene, he said authorities asked Campbell County spokeswoman Leslie Perkins to handle public information for the incident.

“The problem with this is that the protocol with the city is different than the protocol with the county,” he said. “So who approves the news that goes out?”

Shelstad said this was one of his biggest concerns as he wanted to ensure the accuracy of the situation while balancing an ongoing investigation.

“I don’t think anything was done wrong,” he said. “However, seeing how it happened, we think from a PIO perspective we probably need to develop a policy for the way it is. We have a (joint powers agreement) and the city deciding that this should be done through the county, we have to define that.”

Matheny said there is a meeting next week to talk about communication protocols in such situations.