Episode Details

It's time to take a look at what's happening around Wyoming for Monday, December 29th. I'm Mac Watson.

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A woman who fled Wyoming with her baby boy more than a month ago told authorities she "wasn't fast enough" to kill herself before officers got to her in an RV park in New Mexico. Cowboy State Daily's Greg Johnson reports that according to affidavits, Madeline Daly made it clear to authorities she was never going to give her baby back.

"She basically said that she felt she was saving the boy from her, from his father. She made some unsubstantiated allegations that he was abusive, and that no matter what, she wasn't going to allow him because they had a kind of a strained relationship with custody, where he lived in Nebraska and she was living in an RV park in 10 sleep. She mentioned that she was not going to allow the baby to go back and forth from Nebraska to Wyoming twice a month for visits. And when they asked her what she was running from, she responded, 'Judges orders.'"

Daly's first-degree murder charge is a capital offense and has been turned over to the local office of the FBI and the U.S. Attorney's Office for New Mexico. She remains in the Grant County Detention Center on suspicion of first-degree murder and abandonment of a child resulting in death. She's being held without bond.

Read the full story HERE.

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Montana and Montana State, two universities that compete in a tier below Wyoming, each spend $2.2 million on Name, Image, and Likeness, while Wyoming spends $1.4 million. Cowboy State Daily's David Madison reports that one UW booster says that's embarrassing because schools that don't have a lot of money are still outspending the university."

"What would it mean to drop down from big-time Division I college sports into something more affordable, essentially. And there's some really strong feelings around that, so strong that one of my sources, who lives in Laramie, raised a bunch of questions, made the argument that should Wyoming really should drop out of Division I and do what schools like St Francis and Pennsylvania did, where they went from Division I to Division III."

Other sources tell Cowboy State Daily that as it gets closer to the legislative session in February, football and basketball are going to be in the mix of conversations about the state helping the university come up with millions of dollars to keep Wyoming Cowboys football on the Division I level.

Read the full story HERE.

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Celia Easton of Thermopolis said being attacked by a grizzly last October while she was elk hunting alone in the Beartooth Mountains has left her absolutely shaken. Outdoors Reporter Mark Heinz reports that there is a certain mindset that is needed when hunters go out.

"I talked to three people who have tons of experience hunting in grizzly country, and they said, 'You have to have an edge. You can't go in there whistling sunshine or thinking everything's hunky-dory.' that I guess the best way to put it, a healthy fear is good. It's nothing to be paranoid about it, nothing to freak out about. One guy I talked to is a guy I've interviewed before who was actually involved in a bear attack couple years back, had to shoot a bear to death with this pistol to save him and his dad from getting mauled…An edge of respectful fear is a good thing, but there's no sense in letting your fear, you know, of the blood thirsty Grizzlies are coming to get me, that's not going to do you any good, you know, just prepare yourself."